


wrong

by theicebluelineofinsanity



Category: Orange is the New Black
Genre: Angst, BDSM, Background Violence, Bloodplay, Bondage, Choking Kink, Consensual BDSM, Cutting, F/F, Heavy BDSM, Hurt/Comfort, Knifeplay, Masochism, Protectiveness, Trust, Whipping, also edgeplay I guess, also kind of soft!Carol all things considered, and whatever the technichal term for getting off on death threaths is, dom!Carol, implied background sexual abuse, masochist POV, submissive POV
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-25
Updated: 2019-11-16
Packaged: 2020-10-02 18:01:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 27,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20386087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theicebluelineofinsanity/pseuds/theicebluelineofinsanity
Summary: ”You understand”, she repeats through her teeth, ”you know I could hurt you. You know I could kill you. And yet, somehow –” Her voice is incredulous, disbelieving, ” –yet somehow, that turns you on?!"(in which there is presumably very many things wrong with you, but Carol doesn't seem to mind. much.)Heavy BDSM, and a little character development, in three chapters, and also an epilogue, coming eventually.Chapter 3 now finally up!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE READ ALL THE TAGS/WARNINGS up there before braving this fic! There's some seriously fucked up shit here – I wrote it purely for myself originally and didn't exactly intend to post it anywhere to begin with, but then I thought, eh, perhaps there is someone out there who might appreciate it...?
> 
> Since there is basically no connection to canon events, I've decided this takes place some years before the events of OITNB season 6 (which us why Carol is referred to as being ”in her 40's”). So if the prison seems kind of more lenient or otherwise different or whatever, then you can chalk that up to the time difference as well. :)

Her hands close around your throat and she slams you against the cold tile wall, driving all air out of your lungs, and you are terrified, suddenly, in a way you were not even seconds before, because for a moment there, you think that she may actually kill you for real.

”_What the fuck is wrong with you?_” she hisses in your ear, all close and all too close, and her strong fingertips squeeze into the sides of your throat, and you can't _breathe_, and you wouldn't be able to answer even if you did know what to say.

Because the answer is that there is presumably a great deal of things wrong with you. And yet somehow it is this particular wrong that might actually and truly be the death of you: That you were not able to keep your eyes off a woman who might in fact kill you for looking at her.

That was certainly not your plan for prison. No, your plan was the very opposite: to keep your head down, to not provoke anyone, to close yourself off and to not think about anything. Least of all your ten year sentence, least of all that twisting worm of panic that stirs in the bottom of your stomach if you try to think ahead even to the next day. Ten years of this – no, impossible, you knew the moment the prison doors closed behind you that if you allowed yourself to feel the suffocating heaviness of _ten years _closing in all around you, you wouldn't be able to stand it, you might actually kill yourself.

Ten years, and for _attempted murder_ only. At least if you had succeeded, you would have been able to take some kind of vindictive pleasure in the fact that it was_ worth_ it, that at least the bastard was _dead._ You like to think that if you had, in fact, succeeded, that would have turned you into a different person – someone better, someone stronger. You would have been a murderer – and while that would not perhaps have been a_ good _thing, exactly, it would have been some kind of fair exchange, a fair price to pay, for you ridding the world of at least one small evil.

But no. You have failed at being a murderer just like you have failed at everything else in your life, and that is the most painfully frustrating aspect of this whole thing: that you were stupid enough to think you could somehow _change_ something, make something _better – _because when it all came down to it, it turned out that of course you couldn't. You put rat poison in his food and he ate it but he _noticed_, he knew what you had done, he was violently sick but they just rushed him to the hospital and he _lived_, he woke up in a hospital bed and he told everybody just what you had done, and now he's walking around out there with his cop uniform and his gun belt, untouched and unhurt and free to do whatever he wants to whomever he wants, while _you_ are locked up, _in here_, for _ten years_.

Ten years in a high security woman's prison, a seething mess of violence and drugs and gangs and petty grudges, guards who are all too obviously indifferent to any of it, and a cell-mate whose name tag reads 'Mason' but who didn't as much as introduce herself to you when the guard pushed you into her cell: a mousy-haired woman in her late fifties who seems to spend most of her time on her back in her bunk staring into the ceiling and who made it abundantly clear, just by one uninterested look at you that first time you met her, that it is absolutely the same to her whether you live or die in here.

So: one day at the time, one hour, one moment, and you have been refusing to think beyond that. You have kept your head down, you have allowed the women to kick your legs from under you and your food tray out of your hands, you have allowed them to pull your hair and spit stupid questions about whether you think that you are something special, whether you are trying to start something, in your face. You have lowered your eyes and you have answered them meekly that no, you are not looking for trouble, you are not going to be trouble. You are no stranger to school-yard bullies after all, and these days, it doesn't even exactly grate on your pride to just let them have what they want and be done. You understand this: you are new, and you are young, and what most of these women want is just to make you understand your place in the pecking order. Once that was established to their satisfaction, they have mostly – mostly - left you alone.

_She_, though... Carol.

It was not as if you ever meant– It was just that you couldn't help but _listen_, to pay attention, to follow the threads and work out exactly who was who and what was what in this seeming chaos. That is how you have always survived, the habit is as ingrained in you as breathing.

And in the end, all those threads led to _her._

You remember the first time you actually looked at her, the almost shock to your system when you realized who she was. That _this_ was Carol, the woman everybody in here deferred to - that _this_ was whom they spoke about in careful whispers and avoided looking straight at.

You snatched your eyes away immediately, heard pounding, terrified that she'd seen you look at her, even for a heartbeat, but the image was burned into your retinas and your heart kept pounding and you couldn't even see the food on the plate in front of you, much less eat it, even though this was the first day you had been allowed to carry your tray all the way from the food trolley to a table without having it torn out of your hands, food ending up on the floor.

You just couldn't believe you had missed it, up until now. You just couldn't believe how you had not noticed her the moment you walked into prison, because from even that one brief look at her – a tall woman in her late forties with 80's hair and thick glasses, eating her meal at a table surrounded by people who all spoke _to_ her – it was obvious what _power_ she radiated. Real power, nothing like the women who ruined your food and pulled your hair. The kind of power that never needed to steep as low as to ascertain itself like that, the kind of power that just _was, _unchanging and unquestionable.

It made your knees weak. It made your insides turn to liquid. It made that place deep, deep inside of you pound and ache with a sudden, overwhelming desire. And you knew – shit, you_ knew_ – that you should keep your eyes off her. You knew – of course you _knew_ – that she is a very legitimately dangerous woman. That if she caught you looking at her, there was no telling how she might interpret it, what she might do. And that there was no one here - no inmate, no guard – who would stop her.

And yet. Shit, you couldn't help yourself. You couldn't help but snatching, stealing glances, quick and furtive, across the rooms and across the yards, capturing images for yourself, images of Carol at her bridge game, of Carol standing in the yard surrounded by her crew, of Carol turning her head just so, of Carol's lips forming a word you would never hear, Carol, Carol, Carol –

And in the night, when the lights were out and Mason was snoring away in her bunk above you, the power of those images burned unbearably hot in your mind and in your body, and when you slipped your fingers into your underwear and was wet, wet, wet, more wet than you have ever been and all just from stealing glances at her from across a room, that felt like a transgression, too – of course it did. It felt wrong and dangerous to even _think_ about her but you couldn't help yourself, you came on your fingers, all too quick and all too many times but it never could really ease the burning, never really scratch the itch or satisfy the craving and sometimes, sometimes in your bunk at night you fantasized of her looking back at you and you came on your fingers and bit your lip to keep from screaming.

Because, yes, there is indeed a great deal of things wrong with you, and this is just the latest, the most painful: That you have never in your life wanted anybody like you want her.

You should have foreseen that this was exactly how it was going to go: You slammed against the wall, her fingers closing painfully around your throat, choking the air out of you.

You were just going to have a shower. Late at night, almost before lights-out, you figured at that time you'd have the showers to yourself or as good-as, so you took your towel and your soap and you went.

It took you only a second to realize that no – you were not about to have the showers to yourself. That, in fact, you should just turn around and run, disappear out of sight before anybody saw you, because Carol was there.

Not alone, of course – you don't know that Carol ever goes anywhere alone – but it was Carol that your eyes caught at, like they always catch. Carol, damp-haired and newly showered and with a white towel around her chest, and your mouth went dry and your insides turned to liquid and you knew you should have been gone already but you couldn't take your eyes away, you stared for only a spit-second but that was a split-second too long, because Carol turned her head and noticed you.

For the first time, she looked at you, and you thought that your knees were going to give in, for real, that you would faint right there in front of her.

And you knew that this was trouble. That this was exactly what you had been stupid enough to think you could somehow avoid.

But then there was someone else in the doorway – two someone elses, two girls blocking your way as if they really thought that you were so stupid that you were just going to march right in there.

”Scram”, one of them said, not too gently, ”you're not supposed to be here –”

– And you nodded frantically, prepared to flee, but –

”No”, someone else said – a deceptively calm voice, low but dangerous, and your stomach dropped and your knees dropped because you knew who was speaking, of course – how could you _not_ know? ”Actually. Let her in.”

Carol.

She had turned in your direction and you didn't mean to look but you couldn't help it, you looked anyway, yet another dangerous furtive glance courting danger and there she was, naked but for the towel around her body and arms crossed over her chest, looking straight at you, and your heart hammered and you thought you were going to be sick.

Because you had never been this close to her. Because she had never looked at you before. Because from this close, the power she radiated was unbearable. Because you wanted her still, still, hopelessly and helplessly, even while knowing what a terribly dangerous situation you were in, now, because of that.

”Come on now, let her in”, Carol said in that same voice, with just the smallest hint of impatience, to the two now slightly confused girls blocking the door, while never looking away from you. ”I've been meaning to talk to her, for a while.”

And the girls stepped aside, of course, and they let you in, and you went in, of course.

Because it was not as if you had any choice. It was not as if you imagined that running would make it anything but worse.

So you swallowed, and you forced you legs to move, and you kept your eyes rooted to the tiles on the floor, and you walked in, and Carol's crew closed ranks behind you, you felt it more than you saw it.

”Now”, Carol said, more to the others than to you, ”the thing is, this girl here –” and she waved her hand vaguely at you, ” –Who the hell_ is this,_ even!?”

You opened your mouth and you closed it again, because the question was not exactly directed _at you_, and even if it had been, you wouldn't have had any idea of how to answer it, anyway – your heart hammered in your stomach and you thought you could taste blood in your mouth, and you wanted to say _nobody _and _I'm sorry_ and _oh my god please--_.

”New girl”, someone supplied from behind your back. ”In for attempted murder. Poisoned her stepfather. ”

There is a part of you that was surprised that someone would know even that much about you – that someone had paid enough attention to know even those very basic details about you and your sentence, because you had thought you would be utterly inconsequential to these people, all but invisible. But of course, in retrospect, you should have _known_ – these women rule the prison, of course someone would have made their business to know all the new inmates, no matter how insignificant you seemed.

But Carol only breathed out, half a derisive snort, half a disgusted sigh.

”So”, she said, looking at you but still speaking to the others, you felt her eyes on you even as you kept your own gaze locked to the floor, ”the thing is, I've noticed new-girl-poisoned-her-stepfather here looking at me. Staring, even. Not once, not twice, but practically _all the fucking time_. So. I thought, why not invite her in here? Have her explain to me exactly why that is.”

Shit. _Shit, shit, shit_ – for some stupid reason you had almost started to get lulled into some sense of almost security, had almost started to hope that you might get out of this, that whatever this was about was _not_ about _that_.

But of course it was. Of course she had noticed you looking, for all that she had never once moved her eyes in your direction when you did. Of course she_ knew_.

”Hey!” And her fingers were around your jaw suddenly, hard and strong and forcing you to look up at her, forcing you to look her straight in the eye, and she was so close suddenly, all heat radiating from her body, so close and you had never been this close. ”Look at me when I'm talking to you! Why do you keep staring at me? You really thought I didn't _notice?_”

And you shook your head, and you tried to think, but you _couldn't_ think, not with her so close, and her grip around your jaw tightened and you were terrified, and yet you were helplessly turned on, too, and your heart was pounding and pounding and you–

”Just answer the question”, Carol hissed, staring you in the eye and you felt all her power, all her explosive potential for violence lurking in the tips of her fingers pressing into your jaw, on the edges of her voice. ”Why – the – fuck – do – you – keep – staring – at me?”

And you – Because there was no way in hell you could come up with a lie.

”I'm sorry”, you managed, and your voice was small and terrified in your throat, and you swallowed, and she wouldn't let you look away from her eyes but you said it anyway: ”It's just –just that you're the most attractive woman I've ever seen –”

And this, this is what you will always remember: what a strange _relief_ it was to actually say it. Not because of her reaction, because she obviously she did not believe you – she gave a strange, short, hard laugh and let go of your jaw and that hurt, somehow, of course it _hurt_, the letting go more than the touch had – but because you had actually said it. The truth.

The reaction of her crew was some kind of surprised , insecure silence – something you could feel in the air rather than see, them all looking at Carol for cues to how to react, how _she'd_ react, and you were grateful about that, about the insecure silence and them looking at her for cues because you knew – you knew – that if they laughed, if even one of them laughed, Carol would probably kill you, for real, for making them laugh at her.

But they didn't laugh, they just stared, uncertainly, and Carol had backed away from you, just a step but still painfully far away and you wanted her back, suddenly, close to you with her hand gripping your jaw and her eyes boring into yours.

”What, you expect me to _believe_ that?” she said. ”You're, what, eighteen?”

”Twenty”, you said, because you had finally found your voice, and you crossed your arms over your chest and you didn't look at her, and you were terrified still, of course you were, and yet, it was as if you had found some sort of strength in just saying those words. In just saying the truth. It was as if saying the truth was something that no one would ever be able to take away from you, not even if she had her crew beat you to pulp right there and then on the shower floor, for saying it.

”Twenty”, Carol repeated, incredulous. ”And I'm –” She gestured vaguely at herself, something that seemed to encompass more than her body, more than her age. ”You _really_ think I'm going to believe you're staring at me because you think I'm hot, or whatever the hell you're saying?”

”Bitch, do you even know who this _is_?” someone called out behind your back, and someone else took her up –

”Yeah, plenty of dykes in here if you –”

But Carol silenced that second voice, a flick of her hand, never letting go of you with her cold, gray eyes.

”Do you?” she asked, surprisingly calmly. ”Do you know who I am?”

And perhaps she expected you to say no. Perhaps she would even have forgiven you, somehow, if you had said that you hadn't known, that you hadn't had any idea of who she was but now that you knew, of course you would keep your eyes away, and you were so sorry for this terrible misunderstanding –

But you swallowed, forcing yourself to meet her eye. To have that strength.

”Yes”, you said. ”Of course I know. You're –” You licked your lips, trying to chase away that terrified dryness in your mouth. ”You're the most dangerous woman in here. You – Everyone is terrified of you, and I know they're _right_ to be, shit, I'm terrified of you, too, and – I know I shouldn't have even looked at you, I know I don't have the right, but I –Fuck, I couldn't help it, I'm sorry, I just – I've never been so attracted to anyone in my life, and I just –”

And that was when it occurred to you you should probably just shut the hell up, because if you thought Carol had radiated danger before, it was nothing compared to the sudden _spark_ of something igniting in her eyes, the absolute certainty that you had just managed to piss her off, _for real_, beyond any help or repair or apology –

”Everybody, _out –_”, she said, in that voice that was all the more terrifying for being almost quiet, staring at you like she still couldn't quite believe the audacity of what you had just said, and neither could you, really, all you could feel was the terrified hammering of your heart in your chest and the adrenaline making you dizzy, weak at the knees, and then –

Her fingers, cold and strong and hard, closing painfully on your throat so you cannot _breathe. _ Your back, against the cold tile wall, slamming all air out of your lungs. Her face, close to yours, all too close, her body pressing against you, pressing you against the wall.

And this here, this is the moment when you know that if she wants to kill you, she can, she will.

And that doesn't stop it from turning you on.

”_What the fuck is wrong with you?_” she hisses at you, just an inch from your face. Her fingers are digging bruises into the side of your throat, and it hurts like hell and you cannot _breathe,_ and you are _terrified_, of course you are, and yet, yet, you have never felt so alive in your life, so alive and so soaking wet and so full with this hopeless, helpless, all-consuming _want--_”Don't you fucking get it?” she hisses. ”If I want you dead, you'll be _fucking dead_.”

You moan – that is the only response you can possibly get out of your throat, and you cannot tell her, cannot even in this moment possibly articulate that that is exactly what is turning you on – that's it not that you want to _die_, exactly, it's just that knowing that she _could_, that she has that_ power –_

Her fingers dig even deeper at that, making stars bloom at the outskirts of your vision, making darkness start to creep in, her voice coming, suddenly, from far away–

”_Huh? You _like_ this? This fucking turns you on? You have a fucking death wish or something?_”

And then –

Her fingers around your throat loosen – not much, but just enough to let you pull some semblance of air into your aching body.

Just enough to let you know that she is in control, that she knows exactly what she is doing.

Just enough to know that no, she is not going to kill you.

And you –

Oh fuck, you go to pieces.

You go to pieces, because her fingers on your throat hurt and bruise and yet, _yet_ that small loosening is almost, almost a caress. That small loosening is her fingertips sliding against your skin, so ever briefly, and somehow, _somehow_ there is something that is almost tenderness in that small caress. Tenderness at odds with her hard voice, the coldness in her eyes, close, close to yours.

You whimper – a hopeless, helpless sound. Your knees give in for real this time – it is only her hands around your throat, her body pressing yours to the wall, that keep you upright. All of your hopeless, helpless desire flushes in at once, a tidal wave undoing you completely, because this, this is what is wrong with you: you want this and you cannot stop wanting it. You _want want want_\--

”I could kill you right now”, she hisses at you. ”I could do whatever the hell I want to you. No one would stop me. No one would come to help you if they even heard you screaming. Do you _understand_ this?”

And her fingers loosen again, just a little, just enough to give you air to pull in air for an answer, because this time, she seems to actually expect you to answer--

”_Yes_”, you whimper through your aching throat, under her fingers, _Yes, yes, yes –_

”You _understand_”, she repeats through her teeth, ”you _know_ I could hurt you. You _know_ I could kill you. And _yet_, somehow –” Her voice is incredulous, disbelieving, ”–yet somehow, _that turns you on?!_”

Her fingers around your throat loosen again, just enough to let you pull a deep breath into your lungs and that is a relief, of course that is a relief, and your throat hurts and yet, yet, you desperately do not want her to let you go –

”_Yes_”, you whimper again, ”_oh god, Carol, please--_”

She slams you against the wall again, pushing even closer to you now, the power of her body, the power of her _closeness_, making you whimper again, hopelessly – her hands are around your throat still, hard enough to hurt but not hard enough to actually kill you, and you press yourself against her fingers, into the pain –

”You _like_ this?” she hisses, as if she still doesn't quite believe you, and you don't have an answer, you don't have a single coherent thought in your head, you press your body closer to hers even thought you know you probably shouldn't but you can't help it, she's _here_ and she's close, all heat and danger and you want, you _want –_ ”Huh? This makes you wet?”

”_Yes_”, you whisper, closing your eyes, pressing closer to her –

–and she lets you go.

She lets you go only slowly, her hold on your throat loosening, backing away only a fraction of an inch, and you whimper again, at the sudden cold, at the _loss_ of her, you don't want her to let you go –

”Yeah?” she asks in a low voice, drawing back and looking you in the eye. ”Then prove it.”

Prove it? Your head is spinning, confused, you have no idea what she means, for all that you are prepared to do absolutely anything for her.

She looks at you, cold and impassive and yet, cheeks oddly flushed.

”Touch yourself. If this really turns you on so much, touch yourself. I'll watch.”

Oh _jesus_. You– You didn't think it was possible to get more painfully, achingly wet but yet it rushes in, wave after wave and your mouth is dry, your heart hammers so loudly you are certain she must hear it, she _must_ know, but she only draws away, leaving you panting and aching by the wall, and backs a few steps, goes to sit down on the bench on the opposite side of the narrow room.

_Touch yourself. I'll watch. _

She sits, leaning back and crossing her legs and looking at you with those cold eyes, as if she is at least half certain that you are going to chicken out, that this, if nothing else, is what is going to make you break and run, and you –

You – _okay_. You can do this.

You take a deep breath, and you slip your hand into your underwear.

At the first touch, you gasp – you are so swollen and wet and aching that even the smallest brush of your fingertip is almost painful, and she – _she is watching you_.

She is sitting right there, right in front of you, and she is looking straight at you. It is your every demented fantasy and your every muffled scream into your pillow late at night, and your throat is still hurting after her fingers and your body is still aching after her closeness, and you couldn't help yourself if you tried.

It doesn't even take you long. Your fingers know the patterns, and you are so close already, so close- –Your fingers brush at your swollen clit and you are coming, you are coming, hopelessly and helplessly and _she is watching you, _you want to scream but you don't, your muffle your screams in your throat and throw your back against the wall and you come, again, and again, until your head spins and you have forgotten everything, who you are, where you are, what you are doing –

Everything but Carol's eyes on you.

When, at length, you pull your fingers out again and try to regain your breath, try to stop yourself from shaking, from your knees giving in, she is still looking at you. Her eyes are still steady, she is still cold and composed and yet – yet, her cheeks are slightly flushed and her lips have parted just a fraction, and there is something else in her eyes, too, some strange, unknown glittering.

When you meet her eye, though, she snorts a short, cruel laugh.

”You're crazy”, she says. ”Get the hell out of here.”

And you go.

You somehow compose the shaking pieces of yourself, and you go – you push the door open with knees shaking and heart pounding and bruises forming on your throat, and you push your way through Carol's crew waiting outside, they part for you when you flee, and laugh at you, and call things after you that you cannot even quite hear.

Away. Through the common area still crowded enough despite the hour, through the noise and the people and the chaos, pulling your clothing up around your throat, because you don't want anybody to see, you cannot stand anybody seeing –

Back to your bunk, or whatever, not that your cell is much of a source of solace. Mason is in her bunk, of course – and it's not like you want _her_ to see, either, you're hoping she won't bother enough to pay any attention as you're slowly starting to undress while the guards are calling people to go back to the cells, people moving about out in the corridor.

But Mason does see – for some reason she does turn her head when you're undressing, sees the bruises forming on your throat, and she snorts.

”Pissed off the wrong person, did ya”, she says – it's not even a question, and you don't answer, and there is something almost smug in her voice, as if someone choking you half to death was exactly what she expected would happen to you, even for some reason thought you deserved.

But she doesn't know anything. She has no fucking idea of what just happened to you.

So you crawl into your bunk, and pull your blanket over yourself, and when the lights have gone out and you are almost certain that Mason has fallen asleep, you trace the bruises left on your throat with shaking fingers, and you swallow again, and again, to provoke the searing pain cutting through your throat when you do.

Proof that it happened. That it really happened.

_Carol._

Carol's body, her heat, pressing you against the wall.

Carol's hands around your throat, the _pain_ of Carol's fingers digging bruises.

The sliding of her fingertips against your skin when she loosened her grip to let you catch a little air, almost, almost a caress.

Her voice, in your ear: _-_

_I could do whatever the hell I want to you._

–_and yet, somehow, this turns you on?!_

_What the hell is wrong with you?_

Presumably a lot of things are wrong with you. You know that, you have always known that. This –Wanting _this –_ is only the very least of it.

And yet –

_Touch yourself. I'll watch._

Her eyes on you, when you did.

The way her lips parted, just a little, when she watched. The way she breathed, deep and even and almost _too_ in control. The way her cheeks flushed. The goddamned _look_ in her eyes when you had come in front of her, again and again and again –

_You're crazy._

Yes. You are crazy, and there is a million things wrong with you, you have always known that.

And yet. Somehow, somehow, that night under your blankets with her marks on your throat, staring into the darkness with wide eyes and touching your bruises with an ever mounting sense of almost _reverence_, you almost feel as if that might not be a bad thing, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: More explicit BDSM, bondage, whipping, a little light knifeplay. (Or posssibly slightly more than "a little"...)


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, second chapter – I feel the need to stress those warnings again, at this point. If you read the first chapter and thought 'well, that wasn't so much worse that the average Carol/Reader-fic, now was it?' then know that there is considerably heavier stuff coming here. I added a few additional tags/warnings, too – while editing this chapter, it occurred to me that holding a razor blade to someone's throat would probably qualify as edgeplay, seeing as that would be kind of actually dangerous...? So yeah, that's the sort of thing you have to look forward to in this chapter. Now don't say I didn't warn you.

Four days after your encounter with Carol in the shower, you are woken up in the middle of the night.

It's been four excruciating days. Your bruises are blooming and yellowing, and your throat still hurts when you swallow, but the pain is lessening for every day, so it seems like she didn't _really_ break anything.

Of course she didn't. She knew exactly what she was doing, exactly how far to push, and that thought fills you with gratitude, with an intense _warmth_. With an intense longing to do it _again_, to be back in that moment, with your back against the wall and her hands around your throat, back in the pain and the _intensity_ of it.

You do not dare to look at her, though. You _want_ to look – shit, it seems like every ounce of your daily energy is consumed by the deceptively simple act of _not_ looking. In every moment when you share space with her – during meals, in the common area, in the outdoors yard – you are agonizingly conscious of her exact location in relation to you, and to _not_ turn, to fight against the constant magnetic pull drawing your eyes to her is absolutely _exhausting_.

But you don't want her to be angry with you. You can't stand her being angry with you – and you are frighteningly uncertain of whether she is, or not, after what happened in the showers. You don't think so, exactly, but still. Still.

So. You struggle through your days, hour by hour, moment by moment. You try to be invisible, to keep your head down, to not provoke anybody, to avoid people as much as you can – not much different from before, actually, and that in itself is almost painful. It feels like what happened between you and Carol was such a monumental thing, such a monumental moment, that everything should somehow be different after it, and yet, in all too many ways, everything is exactly the same.

Except for the fact that now you can't even look at her – now, you can't even steal those small secret fragments of her to bring you some kind of solace in your bunk at night. You call up your memories and you touch your bruises and you come on your fingers and you weep in frustration because it isn't _enough_, you know you should be grateful that it _happened_, that you got to _have_ it, for those endless, beautiful minutes, but it isn't _enough_, not enough to still the aching itching _craving_ inside of you – in fact, it is almost as if now that you've gotten a _taste_ of it, you feel as if you will die without it, die from the thought of having to go through the rest of your life without ever getting it again.

And your bruises are healing. You are almost frightened of the day when they will be gone, when you will no longer have that tangible proof that it actually happened. You wonder if you will go crazy with it, if you will grow more and more frighteningly uncertain of whether it ever happened, at all.

But then, you are woken up in the middle of the night.

There you are – asleep, certainly, but lightly enough to immediately wake up to the sensation of someone sitting down on the edge of your bed, a split second before that someone taps your shoulder.

”Get up”, a low voice says. ”Carol wants to see you.”

”Huh?” you mumble sleepily – but your heart starts to immediately hammer away, a sensation of mingled dread and excitement flushing through you, your body processing the words quicker than your conscious mind does.

_Carol wants to see you._

You blink at the girl sitting on your bed – you are quite certain that her name is Miriam, a dark-skinned girl perhaps four or five years older than you, hair in cornrows and well-defined muscles in her arms. You have seen her with Carol's crew, of course – in fact, you have been harboring the suspicion that when Carol asked who you were, hers was the voice that answered.

_Carol wants to see you._

Oh shit, what have you done now? You haven't looked at her. Perhaps you _should_ have looked at her. Perhaps you should have –

You have no idea. And yet, the thought of getting to see her makes your mouth turn try and your insides turn to mush. You _want_. You _want_ to see her, so badly and acutely it _hurts_, even if she is angry with you, even if –

”Come on, let's go”, Miriam says, impatiently but not exactly ungently. ”If you pissed her off or whatever, it won't get any better if you keep her waiting”, she adds after a split-second, almost sympathetically, apparently misreading the look on your face.

Walking behind Miriam through the dark night-time prison feels surreal, unreal. The prison looks different in the dark, devoid of all the chaos and the noise and the _people_ that fills it during the day, calm and silent and somehow both larger and smaller. You know that you're not supposed to be out and about, but the sole guard on night duty pointedly looks the other way when you pass.

Of course. Carol can do pretty much as she pleases, in here.

You know that. You have always known that. Your head spins. Your knees are weak. _I could do whatever the hell I want to you, _she hissed in your ear and you _know_ that, you have always known that, and you swallow, your heart pounding– because you are suddenly overwhelmingly conscious of the fact that the absolutely most cruel thing she could possibly do to you is to do nothing at all. To ignore you for the next ten years, to pretend that what happened four days ago never happened – and up until about ten minutes ago, you felt it overwhelmingly likely that that was exactly what was going to happen.

Shit. _Carol wants to see you._ It must mean _something – _something, anything, and you don't even care what. At least you will get to _see_ her, at least you will get to _look_ at her, and – If she _is_ angry, if you _did_ piss her off in some way you don't even know, you just hope to hell she will express that anger by pressing her fingers into your throat instead of pulling some terrible hoax of just calling you there and laughing at you and sending you off again, lonely and cold and unfulfilled.

After what seems simultaneously like an eternity and all too soon, you arrive at the showers – it's not a surprise exactly, to find out that this is your destination, but it makes your heart hammer all the same. Miriam merely nods at the closed door as if to say _go on in, then_, and then takes up a position next to it, obviously intent on making sure no one else walks in.

Well, then. Your head is spinning and your stomach is a knot, but you tell yourself to take a deep breath – _breathe_ – and you open the door, and you walk in.

Carol is sitting on the bench. She is leaning against the wall behind her, legs crossed and looking at you when you come in, eyes cold and impassive behind her glasses, a lollipop in the corner of her mouth and a towel wrapped around her chest for all that she seems to be wearing at least a bra under it– and, _shit_, just that, just the damn _sight_ of her is a flush of relief and desire and terror so intense that your knees go week and you have to fight the overwhelming impulse to just sink to the floor in front of her and beg her for _something, anything._

To beg her to do whatever she wants to you, as long as it is _something._

You swallow, drawing a deep shaking breath and stop uncertainly just inside of the door, saying nothing. The painful hopeless  _need_ for her is twisting in your guts and yet, you do not even quite dare to give into the impulse of sinking to the floor. You're not even certain of whether you're even allowed to look at her but you look anyway, you can't help it, the sight after four excruciating days of being denied it is like water in a desert and you drink it in, you cannot tear your eyes away, you look and you look and you look, almost daring her to get angry at you for looking, to slam you into the wall and–

_Anything._

Carol says nothing, either. For several long moments she just looks at you, an intense scrutiny almost as if she is trying to make up her mind, and purses her lips into a thin line, and moves the lollipop around in her mouth a little with her tongue – and just that, just her eyes on you, makes arousal pound through you, stronger and stronger until you have no idea how you will be able to take her doing nothing.

”Take off your clothes”, she says then, and bites down on whatever there is left of her lollipop, the last of it crunching between her teeth.

It isn't an order, exactly – an order would imply some force to her voice, some need to tilt the words in a way that makes it clear that you must obey _or else_, and there is none of that, there. It is simply her telling you, absolutely and utterly certain you will do exactly as she says without her needing to make in an order, exactly, and it sends a thrill of fire through your entire body and makes your mouth turn dry because it is _something, _at least something, and you nod, of course you nod, and you blush, the blush creeping over you, your hands shaking as you move to do what she says.

So, you take your clothes off. It is strangely terrifying – four days ago you stood here in the shower and you put your hand in your pants and touched yourself and came in front of her, once and twice and thrice, and yet there is something about the simple act of undressing in front of her that feels almost _more_ intimate.

You don't exactly look at her as remove your shirt and your singlet - you keep your eyes to the side and to the floor, and you feel the heat of the blush on your face, and you wonder, of course you wonder, if she is perhaps expecting some kind of show, some kind of striptease, but you also don't know if you _can_, if that is something you have in you to do.

So you simply remove your shirt and your singlet, and then, to win yourself a moment, you kneel and take off your shoes and socks, the position on the floor in front of her so natural it is surprisingly difficult to stand again. To stand in order to pull down your pants, to stand there, then, in front of her, in only underwear.

And at that, you cannot help but dart her a questioning glance, because when she said _take off your clothes _you presume she meant all of then, but – But, at your glance she merely purses her lips, impatiently, and nods.

So, you swallow, and you unhook your bra, let it slide off you, revealing your breasts and your hard nipples to Carol's cold, gray gaze. Then your panties. And there you are in front of her, completely naked, mouth dry and heart pounding and throbbing between your legs, feeling more vulnerable than you ever have and also more –

More _something_. Like her eyes on you - steady and gray and never looking away, looking you up and down in a way that has nothing lewd to it, just a cold appraisal, almost an _acceptance_ – make you _exist_ in a way you never have, before now.

And then, Carol gets up from the bench.

She gets up from her bench and she walks up to you.

Your breath hitches in your throat when she does, and you cannot make yourself even _breathe_. You stand still, absolutely and utterly still, as Carol walks up to you, and grabs you by the jaw. Her grip is firm, but not exactly ungentle, and it makes you whimper all the same, from fear and desire, from her heat, her _closeness_, her _touch. _

“Now, here's the deal”, she says – her voice is cold, but not exactly hard. ”I'm not usually into girls. Much less girls half my fucking age.”

You swallow, uncertain of what to say - uncertain of whether you're expected to say anything at all, your heart still pounding painfully from fear and desire and her overwhelming closeness, and you almost want to look away, but her fingers are steady, firm, around your jaw, keeping you looking at her.

”The other day, though”, she says, her voice hardening slightly. ”_That turned me on._” Her fingertip moves along your jaw, almost gentle – her thumb touches the bruises she left on your neck and you shiver, your eyes falling shut of their own accord, you cannot help it. ”You _liked_ it”, Carol says, in a way that almost makes it sound like an accusation. ”You _liked _that I hurt you.”

”_Yes_”, you whimper, because there is not anything else you could possibly say, your entire being focused on the light touch of her thumb on your bruises, the tingling it sends through your entire body. ”I _did. _I – _Fuck._”

“I went to bed that night”, Carol continues slowly, “and I was fucking wet. I– I touched myself, and I thought of you.” Her breath seems to be coming faster against your face, or perhaps that is just you, your breath coming in pained pants and your heart hammering so quickly you think you may faint because _really? She did that? _

“I want to hurt you again”, she says, very close to your ear. “I want to tie you up, and I want to whip you, until you fucking scream. I want – I want to fucking tear you to pieces, I want to make you _bleed_. If you want _that_ from me, then you're even fucking crazier than I thought.”

“_Fuck_”, you moan, and your knees are about give in – but Carol seems to have almost anticipated that, her grip around your jaw returns, quick as a snake striking, and before you have even caught a breath, she has you backed against the nearest wall – not the same as last time, the opposite one, the one with the actual showers – pressing you against the tiles, keeping you upright.

“_Do you want that?_” she hisses, fingers still gripping your jaw, harder now, almost as hard as you want her to grip, tilting your head back against the wall, making you look at her. “Do you want me to hurt you?”

“_Yes_”, you gasp, feeling your eyes glazing over because yes, hell – Because the through of her tying you up and whipping you until you bleed is terrifying, of course it is, and yet, yet, of course you _want_ it, you want it more than you have ever wanted anything, you want Carol to do whatever she wants to you and to just give in – and if you didn't realize it before that day in the showers, with her hands choking digging bruises into your neck you certainly did: That your craving for her, the painful hopeless _need_ so deep in your body it is almost your soul goes beyond wanting her to touch you, it's a craving aching need for her to _hurt_ you, for her to reach into all of your deepest darkest places and you just never thought she'd – “_Yes._ _Please._”

“Hey! Listen!” Carol's grip on your jaw shifts, tightens even more, pressing your head backwards and you know you'll have bruises, fresh bruises, and the very thought of those new bruises make you soar, but there something about that shift, something about her voice that drives home to you that you are actually expected to pay some attention, here, something that forces you to open your eyes – “_Listen!_” she hisses.

You stare up at her, at her face close to yours, heart pounding, suddenly terrified that she'll change her mind, that she'll withdraw her offer.

“Listen”, she says again, in a slightly lower voice, looking you intently in the eye and holding your head in place, not allowing you to look away, making you meet her eye. “Here's the deal: This is between us, only. You will _never_ tell anybody about this. You will _not_ look at me out there, you will sure as fuck not come up to _talk_ to me – you will fucking pretend this never happened, out there.”

You nod – of course you nod, because of course you know that already, without even needing to be told, of course you would never, ever be so stupid and so ungrateful as to try to force some public connection to her –

”And”, Carol says, voice almost tight in her throat, ”if you want me to stop, you fucking _tell_ me to stop. And I will. Stop. Agreed?”

She digs hers fingers deeper into your jaw. ”_Agreed?_” she hisses, and you nod, again, but the nod is not enough – she wants more than that from you, you know you should be articulating some kind of reply, but it's so hard to _think_, so hard to form _words_, so hard to grasp the concept of telling her to stop when you are absolutely and utterly prepared to let her do anything she wants, and doesn't she _know_ that, doesn't she see that, how your entire body and your entire soul is aching with _need_ –?

”_Yes_”, you choke out. ”Yes, I – I won't, I won't tell anyone, I won't look at you, I won't – I'd never try to fucking _talk _to you, out there!” You swallow, terrified suddenly that the statement was perhaps a little too forceful, not humble enough, but the mere idea that she would actually think you _might_ is deeply upsetting, that she really thinks you might be that _stupid_. “And –” you gasp for some air, the words rushing out of you almost against your will, because as terrified as you are of what she might actually do to you, you are far more terrified of her stopping, “ –just, don't stop. _Please_. Carol, you can do absolutely anything you want to me as long as you don't stop, please don't stop, I want you to tie me up, and – hurt me. _Please. Please hurt me._”

Carol stares down in your face while you talk, her breath on your skin almost as rapid as your heartbeat, the look in her eyes cold and intent and completely focused on whatever expression she can read on your face.

“Yeah?” she breathes when you have finished with your piece, panting and terrified that your begging and your pleading isn't enough or perhaps that it is too much, that isn't good enough, that she is going to change her mind. “Good thing I brought some rope, then. Don't move.”

The last part is very clearly an order, so of course you don't move. Of course you stand completely still, even as you whimper at her absence when she lets go of you, when she withdraws the intensity of her body heat and leaves you cold, alone, leaning against the tiles of the showers. Of course you don't dare to even move a fraction, only follow with your eyes with your head completely still as Carol moves over to the bench where she was sitting, and yes, you have faint impression of having seen a bag there where she might be keeping you don't even know what, and you –

_Shit._ You swallow, this slight interruption enough to actually let you take in the situation. The fact that she's about to tie you up, and that you're about to _let her_, and you're frightened, of course you are, mouth dry and heart pounding with fear over being tied up and at her utter mercy, but the terror and the arousal are twisting together and feeding each other and your anticipation is even stronger than your fear, this strange painful relief that there is in the thought that _she wants to hurt you, _that she is actually _going to_, and you would do anything for that, _anything –_

You take a deep breath, fix your eyes forward when Carol turns around again, don't want to be accused of even moving _that_ much, when she returns, grabbing your right arm and twisting it back, behind your neck, winding _something_ around your wrist, something tight and stiff and unyielding. Black electrical cord – not rope exactly, and perhaps there is some logic in that because how the hell she even managed to get hold of this electric cord inside the prison you have no idea and yet, it feels _right_, the smoothness of the black plastic coating digging into your flesh as she twists it tightly around your wrists and your arms, tying you tightly, tightly, to the pipes of the shower behind you.

And then, there you are, your heart pounding, a reflex making you pull at the cords, some reflex you cannot help wanting to know exactly how tightly you're tied up, and when you pull at the cords with your wrists they dig into your flesh – not painfully, exactly, but firmly, closely, not yielding a single fraction of an inch.

Carol doesn't smile, exactly, but something twists in the corner of her mouth when she looks at you.

“Scared, yet?” she asks in a very low, dangerous voice.

You nod, your throat tight and dry, your heart pounding painfully, and yes, you are scared – of course you are scared, because you may be crazy enough to want her despite and _because_ being terrified of her, but you will never ever be so crazy as to _stop_ being terrified of her, because right here and now, naked and tied up and at her complete mercy, you are again very, very conscious of just how dangerous she is, how capable of absolutely anything and how very, very foolish you were to ask for that _anything._

“Yeah, no”, Carol breathes, “I don't think you're anywhere _near_ scared enough.”

And she takes out a blade.

You yelp. Whatever you expected, it wasn't _that_. It's a terrible weapon, a razor blade fastened to what was probably once a toothbrush, a razor blade so sharp you know, you _know _from just looking at the damn thing_,_ that the merest pressure of that razor sharp edge would cut deeply into your flesh, slice open your skin –

It terrifies you.

And it turns you on so fiercely you think you are almost about to come from just looking at it.

“I told you”, Carol breathes, eyes fixed on your expression, “I want to make you _bleed_. So. Are you scared yet?”

“_Oh fuck,_”, you moan, and you trash against the cords holding you still, but they don't yield, of course they don't yield - but you don't want them to, the thought of her cutting you with that blade, of the razor sliding across and into your skin is possibly the most frightening thing you have ever contemplated, and yet –

And yet: _fuck_ it makes you wet.

“Mm.” Carol is close to you now – she has dropped her towel and is standing in front of you in only underwear, her body just close enough to brush against your skin, just far away to make you whimper at the distance.“'No, I still don't think you quite get it. What I could do to you. What I've been _thinking _about doing, to you.”

Carol moves a fraction closer, the heat of her skin finally, _finally_, pressing against you again and that makes you whimper, again, with longing. Her hand comes up to wind through your hair - she wraps her hand and wrist through your hair tightly, forcing your head back, exposing your throat, holding your head absolutely still - you're unable to move even a fraction of an inch and your heart pounds and pounds as Carol lifts her razor blade and places it just below your ear, on the edge of your throat.

“'Cause the thing is”, she continues in a voice that is almost quiet, the calm in it almost more terrifying than her anger four days ago when she slammed you into the wall and pressed her fingers into your throat until you couldn't breathe, “the thing is that you just don't know. Maybe I've decided I let you off too easily last time, mm? Maybe I'm still angry with you. Maybe I've decided I should just kill you for real, this time.”

Her razor ghosts along the edge of your throat, just the barest hint of a whisper of the edge cutting into your flesh, a shallow, stinging scratch.

Adrenaline explodes in you. The world goes dark before your eyes and something that is less a moan than a scream tears itself from deep within you – arousal bursting though you in wave after painful wave because you know, you _know _that if she wants to kill you she can and she will, of course you know that and have always known that and there is a million things wrong with you and has always been –

And yet, yet, you _want_ this –

And yet, yet – there is something so absurdly _safe_ about her hand and wrist wound tightly through your hair, holding your head absolutely still, something about the fact that she is not letting you move even a fraction of an inch, something about that perfect control that you _trust _with a force that is almost violent.

Trust to not actually kill you. Trust to just run the razor blade down your throat, to just give you a taste of what it might _be _like.

“So”, Carol breathes against your face, lifting the blade from your throat and placing it just below your mouth, just below your lower lip, the edge cold and sharp just against your flesh and you gasp, of course you gasp, “are you scared, yet? Or does this turn you on, too?”

The sound that escapes your throat is, again, less a moan than a scream, a hopeless panting loud _whine_, and you – if she wasn't holding you so tightly, body pressed against yours and her hand wound tightly through your hair, you'd fall apart completely.

“_Yes_”, you moan, “_yes, fuck –_” and you don't even know what the yes means, because you are scared, and you are turned on, and you _want_ this - you _need_ this so very, very badly, her closeness and pain and even the damn razor blade in her hand, even for the damn razor blade to cut into you.

“_Does this make you wet?_” Carol whispers, the pressure of the blade against the trembling flesh just below your mouth increasing just a fraction, enough to cut, enough to slice briefly into your skin and and you moan again, because _yes_, it _does_, it makes you more wet than you have ever been, the sting of the razor and the small trickle of blood starting from the point where the edge touches your flesh _–_ “_Do you _want_ me to cut you?_”

“_Fuck_”, you pant, your breath painfully rapid, “_Yes._”

And when you say it, a new spike of terror shoots through your body, terror and arousal in a sickening, elated mix, because you have no idea what you have just agreed to, and Carol smiles, the way she does not really smile, the hint of something moving just at the edge of her mouth, and that almost-smile is simultaneously the most frightening and the most arousing thing you have ever seen.

“_Tell me how wet you are_”, she whispers, the blade slicing a small shallow wound along the edge of your lower lip - a small cut that nonetheless makes your entire world go dark, makes everything concentrate to the sting of the razor grazing your flesh, and you, _fuck –_ You gasp, moan, you don't even know what, hopelessly and helplessly, because you don't even know how to speak, how to form words, how to express anything beyond _yes_ and _please. _

“_I – Fuck_”, you manage to pant. “_I'm – Fuck. So. Wet._”

So wet that it hurts, and you know she can tell, you _know_, from the way that almost-smile ghosts over the edge of her mouth again, the way something deep in her eyes glitters. “_Yeah?_” Carol whispers, her breath rapid on your face. “_You like this, huh? You like me cutting you? Even though you have no idea how far I might go?_”

She lifts the blade from your mouth, away from your face, and places it just above your collarbone, just below your throat, close enough to the pounding of your major arteries to steal the breath from your lungs.

“So”, she breathes, “_do you want me to make you bleed?_”

The edge of the razor presses lightly into your skin, another shallow cut promising to be deeper and making your moan with half terror and half anticipation, and her tone is teasing, dangerous, and yet, yet in that question you hear, again, what she said, before, before you even quite realized what you were agreeing to: _if you want me to stop, I'll stop. _

“_Oh god_”, you moan, despite yourself, despite the terror of the promise the razor blade is making against your skin, despite and because the singing of the shallow wounds on your neck, below your mouth, because the echo of her words seems more a threat than a promise: “_Don't stop. Please don't stop._”

“_Oh_”, she whispers, cruel and amused and dangerous and in control, “_don't worry, I won't._”

She runs the razor slowly down, down along your collarbone, a long slow lazy cut curving back over the top of your breast, cutting deeper, the blade biting into your flesh, blood trickling up in it's wake, pearls of blood welling up in its wake and stars explode behind your closed eyelids, you gasp, and moan, and possibly you scream – because _fuck_, it hurts, of course it _hurts_, and it feels like nothing on earth, like nothing you have ever, ever experienced, and you want more, _more_ –

“_Maybe I should cut you deeper, huh?_” Carol whispers, lifting the blade again and placing it below your other collarbone, and you moan in helpless anticipation as she draws the razor slowly downwards, a stinging slicing curve vaguely reminiscent of a C, touching the top of your other breast and crossing the other line she drew on your flesh somewhere just above your heart, and you, _fuck_, there are sounds coming out of your and you don't even – “_Leave a scar? Write my name, perhaps?_”

And that is just – Oh god, the thought of her cutting deeper, deep enough to leave a scar makes you almost sick with fear and yet you want it, you want the pain and the scar and oh god the _scar_, her name written on your skin for you to run your fingers over in the middle of the night to remember, _remember_ –

“_Yes, god, please!_” you moan, terrified and not entirely sure you will be able to stand it but wanting it all the same, _wanting wanting wanting –_

Carol laughs, almost – a deep, rich sound, and she lifts the blade from you and lets go of your hair; you are almost as relieved as you are disappointed. “Maybe I will”, she says in a low voice. “Some day. If you prove to me that you deserve it. _Fucking crazy bitch_”, she breathes then, so softly it's practically an endearment, and then, she bends down to lick the wound on your chest.

She licks the wound on your chest, a long single continuous swipe of her warm, wet tongue over the scratch in your flesh, and you moan, scream almost because the sensation is almost the opposite of pain, soft and hot and absolutely unexpected. She runs her tongue along the wound, over the top of your breast and along your collarbone, and then, she bites at the half-healed bruises on your neck.

You yelp – the first bite is not even particularly painful, only almost a warning about what is about to come, but then she bites again, harder, her teeth hard and bruising into the already tender flesh. It makes pain shoot out from your neck in all directions, and your eyes are closed but you see light anyway, a perfect star of pain exploding in your vision –

“_Fuck_”, Carol breathes in your ear, her breath coming quick and ragged, “_you're making me so wet._”

She bites you again, pressing her body into yours, close, close, the heat of her body and her closeness mingling with the pain of her bites, her teeth finding new places along your neck, your shoulder, biting down on you again and again, hard and bruising, every bite singing in your blood and in your soul and you moan, perhaps you scream, there are sounds coming out of your throat and this, this is everything you have ever dreamed about and yet, yet, it is still not _enough_, there is some dark deep part of you opening and opening and opening and wanting more, _more –_

“_More, please –_” you hear yourself begging, pleading, almost despite yourself, almost afraid that you asking will cause her to not give it to you, but no –

“_More?!_” Carol whispers in your ear, her breath quick, and she bites your neck again, even harder this time, hard and sharp and you scream, moan, pushing yourself into her teeth and into the pain, “_You have the fucking gall to ask for more? You really think this is all I'm gonna do to you? I'm gonna fucking whip you til you scream, did you forget about that already?_” Another bite at your neck, lower, almost at your throat, another sharp sting of pain exploding through your entire body, and then: “Get down on your knees.”

She pulls at the cords tying you to the shower pipes, and you feel them running loose, suddenly – the cords are still wrapped tightly around your wrists, still digging into your skin, but the part of the cords tying you the pipes behind you give away, allowing you to sink, gratefully, to your knees on the hard shower floor.

And you – No, at this point, you are absolutely beyond any terror, beyond any fear, she can whip you into oblivion, she can annihilate you completely, you don't care, you _want_ it, you need it and you crave it like you have never needed, craved, anything else in your life, and this, _this_ – There is nothing in your life that has ever felt as totally, agonizingly _right_ as being on your knees in front of her. On your knees, turned to allow Carol access to your smooth, unhurt back, wrists still tied to the shower pipes with a long, taut cord, holding your hands in place in the air in front and above you, heart pounding in dreadful, overwhelming anticipation.

The whip Carol is holding is more of that black electric cord, several strands of it tied together and it makes your mouth water, it steals the breath from your lungs, making your entire body ache in expectation as she takes another step closer, running a finger down between your shoulder blades, almost softly.

“Now this is going to hurt like hell, crazy girl”, she says in a low voice, almost as tender as it is dangerous.

And your mouth goes dry and you twist your hands around to grab at the cords tying you to the pipes, and you nod, you nod, and she whips you.

The lashes explodes across your back, simultaneous bursts of pain all over your back, exploding through your body and you scream, because it _hurts._

Of course it _hurts_, because pain is not pleasure, pain is pain and it hurts like hell_ – _and yet, there such _relief_ in that pain, too. Such bone-deep all-consuming _relief_ in the moment of the whip exploding against your skin, finally, _finally_, something reaching deeply enough into into the starved yawning darkness of your soul to satisfy it, condensing everything you are into this very moment of her whip exploding agony across your back, echoing in the aching stinging welts you can _feel _rising on your skin immediately in response, and you want more, _more –_

“_Again?_” Carol whispers, and you nod, you nod, tears in your eyes but the tears are from gratitude, from happiness, from this all-consuming _relief_ of getting exactly, exactly what you crave--

And she whips you again.

She whips you, and you scream. She whips you, harder, the new pain exploding in the stinging echoes of the first one, intensifying it, and you scream, with pain and relief and gratitude, and she whips you, again, yet harder.

And again. And again. And again.

Harder. Faster.

The pain explodes over your back, again and again and again, the short pauses between each lash shorter and shorter, intensifying and intensifying until you almost can't stand it, your throat raw from screaming and nothing, nothing existing expect for this moment, the eternity of the pain, the pain, exploding through you again and again and again, the world an ocean of agony and relief and pleasure, engulfing you totally, your only point of certainty the cords around your wrists you're holding on to, and _her,_ the absolute certainty that this her doing this to you, _her_, Carol, _Carol_ –

At length, you become conscious of her having stopped.

And probably, that is a good thing. Your throat is dry from the screaming and your back is an aching, stinging wasteland of what is probably very many red angry welts, and you gasp for breath, your head swimming with the adrenaline and your eyes unable to focus and if it wasn't for the cords around your wrists you'd probably be flat on the floor.

“Can you stand?” Carol asks, from somewhere far away, and then you feel the heat of your body closer to you, and you are vaguely conscious of her doing something to the cords, not releasing you but pulling you up, tightening the length the of cord running from your wrists to the shower pipes, lifting your hands slowly, and no – you are not certain you can stand, your entire body is weak and shaking but she helps you, she pulls at the cords and her body is close to yours, her skin hot and almost naked against yours, close and helping you, and slowly, slowly you can stand.

“Did you you like that_?_” she whispers, her fingers surprisingly gentle on the side of your face as she removes a strand of hair sticking to the sweat on your cheek, her fingers surprisingly soft after the biting lashes of her whip, and you try to answer _yes_, and _thank you_, you try, but your throat is too dry after the lashing for you to quite get any sound out. “Did that make you wet?_”_

And: _yes._ Of course it made you wet – now, now that the intense pain of the whipping is ebbing out, becoming only aching echoes in the welts across your back, you become, again conscious of the fierce throbbing between your legs. Intensified, almost paradoxically, by the gentle way she is touching your cheek.

You moan, and you nod, and try to get your breathing under control, try to find your voice, to say yes and to say something, to beg for something –

“Yeah?” Carol whispers, very close to your face. “If you weren't tied up right now, would you be touching yourself?”

You moan. “_Yes_”, you manage this time, very faintly, and even though your eyes are still closed, it is almost as if you can _hear_ Carol smile in that small, amused exhalation of breath on your face.

“_Yeah?_” she whispers again. “Would you like me to... touch you, instead?”

_Fuck._ Again you are grateful for the cords tying you up, holding you upright, because _shit_, you thought she would have you beg to be released, beg to have your hands free to touch yourself and

the mere thought of _her_ touching you, instead, of _Carol_ touching you – it is almost enough to drive you crazy, to make you pull your wrists hopelessly against the cords tying to up, because if that is just her teasing you, just something she _says –_

“_Fuck_”, you moan. “_Please. Yes. Please._”

There's an other faint exhalation of breath on your face, then her fingers curl down your chest, down your stomach, a touch so soft and gentle you can only possibly call it a caress, and you gasp for breath, for air, moaning in frustration when her hand stops halfway down your stomach, just short of actually _touching_ you where you need it the most.

“_You sure?_” she whispers.

“_Yes. Fuck! Please!_” You'll beg. If that what it takes, you'll beg, of course you will, because your heart is hammering and your throat is dry and if she _doesn't_ touch you, if she _doesn't_ actually go through with it after teasing you will die, you will go utterly crazy because you're _aching_, now, for her fingers to touch your throbbing swollen clit, to give you release and if she doesn't, if she doesn't –

But she does. Her fingers on your stomach move again, dropping down low between your legs and at the merest brush over all the slick pounding wetness her finger dips inside you and she draws in air, sharply through her teeth, almost as if she is surprised.

“Fuck”, she murmurs, “you weren't lying.”

You should possibly say something but you can't, your entire being is concentrated to Carol's fingertip sliding lightly through your wetness, her fingertip softly circling your swollen clit making you gasp for air, the light touch almost more powerful than you can stand.

“That's good”, she murmurs, almost softly, biting you very lightly on the neck, a nip that is not even exactly painful, “you shouldn't ever lie to me.”

And somewhere in some part of your mind that manages to still be barely conscious of her words, you want to tell her, no, never, you'd never lie to her, but when you open your mouth only gasps and moans come out – her fingertip moves down again, the length of her finger brushing against your clit in a circling motion, her fingers sliding in your wetness, her skin and her warmth and her closeness against you and only the cords around your wrists holding you, anchoring you.

“Do you touch yourself in your bunk at night?” she whispers in your ear, finger caressing your clit and fuck, you almost come there and then, at that, at her words reminding you of every night you have lain in your bunk and thought of her, and never ever thought that you would ever get this, _this, _her hand between your legs and her voice in your ear,_ Carol_ –

“_Yes_”, you manage to pant out.

“And what do you think about, when you touch yourself, huh?” she whispers.

“_You_”, you manage, more a groan than a word, twisting under her fingers, the pleasure almost too intense to stand, and you are so, so close to coming, already, already and too soon – “_Always. You._”

“Mm.” It's less a word than an exhalation of breath in your ear, and she bites lightly on your earlobe, her breathing rapid in your ear - she keeps her mouth there, breathing in your ear, fast and shallow and almost panting and _that_, the fact that _this, you_, is turning her on is almost more than you can stand, waves and waves of arousal washing over you as her fingers slide over your clit, more pressure now, and it feels so, _so good_, and you – 

– And you almost don't want to come, don't want this to be over, but you can't help it, the pleasure is building and building and her finger brushes your clit again and again and again and she breathes in your ear and and you can't take it, you come on her fingers, moaning and panting and possibly screaming, you don't know, the orgasm rips itself through you, intense and explosive and yes, you are definitely screaming, screaming and coming and bucking against her fingers sliding through you you, coming and coming and coming again like you never have, never like this, never _with her_ –

Coming and coming again, until you are aching and exhausted and more thoroughly satisfied than you ever thought it was possible to be.

Carol lifts her hand from between your legs then, and even though you are too aching and exhausted to stand any more, you still moan at the absence, at the emptiness her fingers leave behind.

She takes her fingers out of you, and with her other hand, she pulls silently and the cords again, releasing the knots, the cords loosening, first releasing you from the pipes. You slowly let your hands fall down – it's a relief, in it's way, too, to feel the blood return to your hands.

You stand still, still leaning against the wall, the fierce pounding of your heart slowing and gradually regaining your ability to breath normally, to stand unsupported, as Carol loosens the cord around your wrists, unwrapping it and taking it away - and you have suddenly no idea what you should do without it, feeling suddenly lost, set adrift, vaguely wondering what you're supposed to do now, but for the moment unable to do much more than to lean against the wall, breathing.

Carol's hand comes up to your face again, her fingers brushing lightly against your lips - her right hand, the land she had between your legs, the fingers she slid over your clit again and again and you open your mouth, you lick at her fingers because that seems the only natural thing to do, you taste yourself on her fingers, your own taste and your wetness and your gratitude, and Carol makes a small sound, sliding her fingers deeper into your mouth so you suck at her fingers, suck them clean of any trace of you and when your eyes come open, she is staring at you in the same way she stared four days ago, cheeks flushed and lips slightly parted.

”Lick me”, she says – and it's a command, of course it's a command, but she looks you in the eye when she says it, a deeply searching look, one that is asking for your consent, looking for any

hint that she does not have it.

But you nod, of course you nod. You nod and swallow and a shiver of nerves runs over you, suddenly - you are suddenly, acutely nervous like you have almost forgotten to be, nervous that you will not really know what you are doing but wanting to do it anyway. Of course you want to, of course you want to do that to her, _for_ her - your eyes are glazing over at the thought of _you_ getting to give _her _pleasure, _something_, something as even a small inadequate _thank you_ for everything she has given you tonight.

Carol looks at you a moment longer, then she nods, too, and moves backwards. You move with her, as she sits down on the bench, and you sink down on your knees on the floor in front of her, looking down on the hard stone tiles, heart pounding in anticipation and nerves as she removes her underwear.

As she spreads her legs, for you.

You take a deep breath, and you move in.

She's slick, wet, hair soaked as you move in, carefully, slowly touching her with the tip of your tongue. You feel her twitching, hear something that is almost a moan as you move the tip of your tongue up, carefully swirl the area around her clit. She tastes good, clean and strong and you feel your initial nervousness dissipating when she responds, when she gasps and presses herself closer to you, into your mouth.

Her hand comes up to sit in the nape of your neck, and you are almost startled at the _gentleness_ of that gesture. There is nothing forceful in her hand, it moves with you and lets your draw back when you need air, and her fingers move against your scalp, almost a massage, sending your nerves tingling, combining with her slick wetness and her taste, under your tongue and in your mouth, the fact that you are doing this to her, that you are fucking _allowed_ to do this to her--

You grow bolder, using more of your tongue, sliding it over and around her clit, down and up and down again, down to where her wetness and her taste is most intense, and god, this is so _good_, she tastes so _good – _ Your hear her gasping, gasping and moaning and cursing and it's the most beautiful sound you have ever heard, the fact that you can _do _this, that you can make _Carol_ sound like that, can make her this beautifully, gorgeously wet–

_You._

“_Fuck_”, she gasps, twisting in your mouth, “_oh fuc_k –”

–And suddenly, she's coming. Suddenly, she's shuddering and jolting in your mouth, her hand gripping your neck harder, pressing into your mouth and your tongue and coming, she's moaning and twisting and you don't stop, you make her come, again, again, and fuck, you never knew you could be so good at this, could love it so much, could make Carol come on your mouth, again and again –

When she removes her hand from your neck, you know that she has had enough. You draw back, pulling in a deep breath, and wipe at the corners of your mouth, savoring the taste, and Carol closes her legs, leaning against the wall behind the bench.

“_Fuck_”, she breathes, quite faintly, and yes, you quite agree.

_Fuck._ Everything that has happened tonight is slowly starting to sink in – yet it still feels unreal, too good to be true.

You swallow. “_Thank you_”, you whisper, even though your voice is almost breaking over the words, because you absolutely _have_ to say it. “_Thank you._”

Carol doesn't exactly reply, but when you dart a glance at her, she looks back and gives something that is almost a nod.

You lean against the bench next to he, arms on the bench and your face on your arms – you cannot possibly find it in you to get up from the floor, to remove yourself from this position on the floor by her feet, so you just lean on the bench next to her, close enough to almost feel the heat from her body, but not quite close enough to touch her, because of course you wouldn't ever, ever dare to put your head on her lap even though there is a part of you that would rather like to.

Of course not. She's still _Carol_. Dangerous, unpredictable, powerful Carol.

And for the first time in a very, very long time, something feels like it is enough, like something has finally stilled inside you. You lean against the hard wooden bench next to her, and you breathe, you breathe, and you savor all the marks on your body she has left you with: The long aching welts across your back, making your entire back sting, the deeper cuts across your chest and the one below your mouth, the shallow scratch after her razor on your throat, the new bruises after her teeth on your neck melting into the older ones after her hands.

Your wrists are vaguely aching too, and when you lift one of your hands and look, you see that the cord has bitten quite deeply into your flesh, leaving not bruises exactly but red marks circling your hands and your wrists, and you find yourself _hoping_ that they will develop bruises, too.

Carol turns her head and looks at you then, follows your gaze to your wrists.

“Mm”, she says. “Maybe next time, I'll wrap that thing around your throat, instead.”

And you – You are too exhausted and satisfied for arousal but at her words a spike of arousal runs through you anyway, almost too much to stand, and you moan.

“Yes”, you gasp. “Please.”

And that almost-smile ghosts over the corner of Carol's mouth again.

“You do want there to be a next time, don't you?” she says, only half-teasing.

And you – Hell, what does she _think?_ You have been refusing to think beyond this moment, beyond your gratitude for tonight, but at her words something opens inside of you again, the deep pained happiness of being offered something you had not even quite dared to hope for.

“Yes”, you swallow, the emotion in your voice almost embarrassing you, “of course.”

“Mm”, Carol says, looking away. “Remember what you agreed, and there will be.”

To not tell anyone. To pretend this never happened, out there. To not look at her. To not come up to fucking _talk_ to her – of course not. All of that is _easy_.

_This is between us, only – _and that is not a bad thing. That is a gleaming jewel of a secret, something you can hold on to and keep, no matter what else happens to you in here.

Leaning your face again against the hard wood of the bench next to her, the echoes and the promises written all over your body, you are the happiest you can remember ever being.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that was pretty much a 9,000-words sex scene. Whoops. 
> 
> Next/last chapter: A slightly different wibe, less sex, more angst, more hurt/comfort:ish. Also, heavy bloodplay and cutting, because of course that's the obvious definition of 'comfort'... And also some sex.
> 
> (For this chapter I ended up doing a more extensive edit/rewrite than I expected, and of course, stupid Real Life kept getting in the way – I have some hopes of perhaps being quicker about the third and last, but realistically we're probably looking at around 3 weeks for that one as well, seeing as my spare time is unfortunately rather limited. But I'll get there!)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this chapter is a little different from the first two – it's angstier, and heavier, and more... emotional, I guess, in a lot of ways. 
> 
> In addition, there's implied background sexual abuse, implied background abusive relationships, doubt of one's worth, that sort of thing – nothing explicit, but lots of possible triggers. Sorry. 
> 
> (Also, like I warned about in the end notes for the second chapter: heavy knifeplay, so if you were any kind of uncomfortable with Carol cutting the POV character in last chapter, be warned that this chapter has something a notch up from that. )

You have been in prison for almost four months, and... involved... with Carol for about three, when you get into trouble with two of the other women.

Perhaps “get into trouble” is not an entirely accurate description. You are sitting on your bunk one day, in those endless hours between lunch and dinner, reading a book and minding your own business, just like you have been doing most days since arriving in prison - the book you're reading is not very interesting, but the selection from the trolley is very limited, and you have to do _something _to pass the time, after all.

And all of a sudden, two women very matter-of-factly march into your cell and sit down on either side of you, laughing. One of them grabs yours hair and pulls your head back, while the other knocks the book out of your hands and twists your arm – hard, making pain shoot all the way up through your shoulder, tears springing to your eyes immediately.

They put their faces very close to yours, and they tell you, in no uncertain terms, that tomorrow morning at ten o'clock, you are going to go to the broom closet in the C-corridor, and there, you are going to get down on your knees, and you are going to suck C.O. Hellman's dick.

If you do this, they say, they might – just might – reconsider beating you until you are begging for your pathetic little life.

You say you'll do it. You say it, and you weep, and they laugh, and they get up, and leave you there, tears flowing down your cheeks and your arm and shoulder throbbing, making you worry that they have hurt it, for real.

You say you'll do it, because right there and then you really don't feel like you have much choice, and you weep and feel sick when they leave you, because you really, really don't want to suck C.O. Hellman's dick.

You really, really don't want them to beat you to death, either.

You weep, because you somehow thought –You don't know what you thought. You know that this sort of thing happens in prison. You know what is going on here: them wanting some sort of favor from C.O. Hellman, and him agreeing to grant it in exchange for a blowjob, but of course, _they'r_e not the ones who'll do it, they'll just make someone else. You.

”Better get used to _that_”, Mason comments from her bunk with that small smug satisfaction in her voice, having of course overseen and overheard the whole thing, ”once he gets a taste of your sweet little mouth on his dick he's gonna want it again.”

You just –

You just somehow thought that it wouldn't happen to _you._ You just somehow hoped that if you were small and insignificant and humble enough, people would leave you alone, forget that you existed – and it's not as if that strategy has ever exactly worked out for you previously, and perhaps you were doubly stupid to hope that it might, _here_, in a high-security prison, but it's all you've _got_, and nothing worse than having your food ruined and your hair pulled happening for almost four months has lulled you into a sense of false security.

You suppose that you thought that being involved with Carol would somehow protect you from that sort of thing.

But of course it doesn't.

Whatever connection there is between you and Carol is secret and private – invisible and unseen – and therefore, it doesn't afford you any protection, at all.

And –

And up until now you've _liked_ that it was secret and private. You've _liked_ that it was between the two of you only. For three months you have been woken up in the middle of the night, fairly regularly, every fifth or sixth night, and you have been brought to see her. You have been brought to see her, and she has met you in the showers with her cords and her razor and her ghost of a smile, and she has tied you up and bruised you and cut you and whipped you and hurt you, making you scream in pain and in ecstasy, tearing you down and rebuilding you, a little better and stronger for every time.

Three months of the best thing that has ever happened to you. Three months of echoes and memories for you to carry under your clothing and cherish when no one sees, three months of knowing that no matter what anyone else thinks of you in here, at least you have _this._

A gleaming jewel of a secret.

But now –

Now, when those two women have marched into your cell and twisted your arm and told you in no uncertain terms what you are going to do tomorrow, _now_ you understand what it being secret actually _means. _

Then you are on your own, with this.

That those two women can do that to you. That they can make you go to that broom closet tomorrow, and that there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.

And for a moment – for one, terrible moment – you cannot help but wonder whether Carol knows what they are going to make you do. Whether she knows, and just doesn't care. Whether she even ordered them to –

No. You know she wouldn't do _that_. You _know_, deep in your soul and in your body, in every bruise and cut on your skin, that she does care about you, in her way. You _know_ that, you know that from the way her fingers feel on your skin when you are together in the showers, from the look in her eyes, the ghost of a smile in the corner of her mouth when she runs her razor down your skin, making you scream in ecstasy more than in pain.

And of course it is perfectly possible that she just doesn't know. Carol rules the prison in a very real way, but that doesn't mean she knows or cares about every single measly detail of what goes on in here.

But it's not like you can tell her, because you fucking _promised._

_You will not look at me, you will sure as fuck not come up to _talk _to me – you will fucking pretend this never happened, out there._

You want to stop crying, but you can't.

You sit there on your bunk, tears flowing down your face, ugly painful tears, sobs racking at your entire body, because of course, your very first thought when those women walked in here and pulled your hair and twisted your arm and told you what you are going to do, was that you could tell Carol, and she could stop them.

For her, it would be _easy_. It would take nothing but a word from her, she could tell them to leave you alone and they _would -_ it's not like anyone in here would dare to go against Carol, and it's not like she would need to explain herself to anyone, if she chose to suddenly and randomly interfere like that.

But if she did, people would wonder _why_ she chose to interfere on behalf of some random, insignificant girl. People would wonder, and people would whisper, and people would _know - _and it's not like you have any kind of right to expect that from her, because she made this very clear to you from the start: that this was to be between the two of you, only.

You know you have no right to ask her for anything. You have no right to even _talk_ to her.

So you suppose that tomorrow morning at ten o'clock, you are going to go to that broom closet, and you are going to go down on your knees and you are going to suck C.O. Hellman's dick. You are going to do it, and you are going to live with it just like you have lived with everything else you have lived with – it might not even be, you suppose, the _worst_ thing that has ever happened to you.

You know you are nothing, in here – you have known that, from the moment you first walked into prison. You have accepted your place in the pecking order, the lowest-of-the-low, because there is nothing else you can possibly be, and this is what that place _means_. It means that those two women can march in here, and they can make you go to the broom closet and suck a C.O's dick for some favor that will be done for _them_, not even for you yourself, and there is absolutely nothing you can do do stop it, and the only thing you have any right to be surprised about is that this hasn't happened much sooner.

And you are just so, so _sick _of this being what your life is.

You know that you should have asserted yourself the moment you walked into prison. You _knew_ it, even then, that that is what you are _supposed_ to do if you want to avoid things like this – you should show everyone that you are _not_ weak, that you are not going to take any shit, that no one can mess with you.

But that is the problem, exactly: That you are exactly that weak. That you will never be able to be anything else.

Even now, you could, you suppose, stilldo_ something _to save yourself_._ You could get yourself a weapon, a shiv, and you could march up to those two women, and you could – you don't know, just take your shiv and stab them, and perhaps that would show people that you are not to be messed with, but –

The very notion is ridiculous, utterly unrealistic. You wouldn't even know how to get hold of a weapon, much less how to use it – you couldn't even kill your stepfather with poison, if you walked up to someone waving a shiv people would just laugh at you.

You are nothing, in here, just like you were nothing, out there. The very reason you even ended up in prison to begin with was because of that brief gap of time when you thought that you could somehow _change_ that, that you could somehow become something you're not, someone different, someone stronger. That you could kill your stepfather, rid the world of him forever, when it turned out that of course you couldn't.

You just hate him _so much_, the emotion rising in your throat, suddenly and abruptly, something you have pressed down and down and dismissed as useless but which refuses to be dismissed, any longer. You hate him for just _refusing to die_, for eating the damn rat poison and _noticing - _you hate him for the look in his eyes that was not even really fear even though he realized what you had done, not even really fear because he never truly believed that you would have the power to kill him, and you hate him for being _right_.

You hate him for being free and untouchable, for walking around out there as if he has never done anything wrong, never done anything that could possibly merit the damn rat poison in his food, for the self-righteous indignation in his voice when he told everyone you had tried to murder him.

_You_ trying to murder _him –_ as if the idea was more ridiculous that upsetting.

Of course you couldn't, and you should have known better than to even _try. _You were nothing out there, and you are nothing in here. Those women walking into your cell – snatching away, in the space of only a few moments, the tenuous sense of peace and security you had somehow managed to find for yourself, despite everything – has made that perfectly clear.

And you are abruptly so _angry_ at them, you abruptly _hate_ them with a terrible impotent rage you didn't think you had in you, for doing this to you. For snatching away all the relief and happiness that rushed through your veins the moment Carol grabbed you by the jaw and told you she wanted to hurt you.

_Carol._

You close your eyes, thinking of every cut and every bruise she has given you, every bite and every lash of her whip, every time she has ran her razor down your skin, leaving marks, leaving echoes of herself on your body - echoes you can feel, even now, under your clothing, the vague aches of half-healed wounds and yellowing bruises. She has left traces of herself everywhere on your body, everywhere on _you_, and perhaps that doesn't mean half as much to her as it does to you, of course you have no right to expect that it would mean anything at all to her, anything but a moment's amusement, but –

But.

_Shit._

Could she really leave all those traces on your body, mark you with her whip and her teeth and her razor, have you on your knees in front of her giving freely absolutely anything she'd ask, and then not care at all about you being forced to go on your knees in front of someone else?

_Could_ she?

Would she prefer you going to that broom closet in order to keep your secret and your promise, or –

Or might she actually _want_ you to tell her so she could stop it?

You honestly don't know, and it scares you that you don't know.

Because the only way to know for sure, the only way to find out, is of course to _tell_ her, and the mere idea of doing that makes you sick to your stomach. The idea of somehow walking up to her during her bridge game, or even to somehow signal for attention, the idea of her cold hard eyes turning on you asking without a word what the hell you think you are doing, breaking your promise –

You _can't_.

And yet –

Yet. You try to imagine the alternative: Going to the broom closet, and sucking Hellman's dick, and then, after that, somehow – Somehow just getting to your feet again, and pretending like nothing, and waiting until Carol calls you again to the showers? Going to meet her, and somehow pretending like it never happened, that you have never been on your knees in that broom closet?

Can you do that? Can you really stand there in front of her, pretending like nothing – can you really surrender yourself to her, knowing that you won't even be able to tell her about it, because –

Because, what?

Because even if there is a part of you that is terrified at even the _thought_ of trying to talk to her, _now_, in broad daylight, there is another part of you that is equally terrified of the possibility that she _might_ actually wantyou to tell her.

That she might actually_ not _know - that she might actually be _even_ angrier at you, if she found out, only afterwards, when it will be too late to do anything about it.

It's _possible,_ you suppose.

But you don't_ know._

And that is the terrible clincher of this horrible situation: That you have absolutely no way of _knowing_, short of actually breaking your promise.

_Fuck._

This is, just possibly, the hardest decision you have ever had to make.

But if you can't tell Carol - and if you can't find that shiv and take care of it yourself, an impossible absurd idea - then the only remaining alternative to going to the broom closer is to simply _not_ go. To wait for the clock on the wall to pass ten o'clock and not go, and wait until those two women come to beat you half to death.

And they are not like Carol. They will not stop if you tell them to stop, they will not stop even if you _beg_ them to stop - they will hurt you, for real, they will beat you until you are broken, for real, until you will do anything they say even if you don't want to. Something about knowing, having experienced pain that builds you up instead of tearing you down, makes the idea of having to endure the other kind of pain, _ordinary _pain that just hurts and does nothing good, feel like a sacrilege – it makes you feel sick in the very bottom of your soul, it's something that you know you will not possibly be able to take.

_Shit._

You're going to tell her. You _can't_ – but you _will_, anyway.

You're going to tell her, and then – well, then at least the rest will be up to her. Then at least it will be up to her to make some kind of decision.

And if she decides to do nothing – well, then at least you'll _know._

You sit on your bunk, taking deep shaking breaths, trying to calm down, trying to stop the tears – and eventually, slowly, succeeding, the decision somehow making you calmer, the fact that you have made a decision, some kind of decision, no matter how terrifying it is.

And eventually, you have calmed down enough to be able to get up, to get to your feet. There is still a part of you that can't quite believe that you are actually about to do this, but you do. You get up on your feet and with legs shaking, you take those steps out of your cell, leaving Mason behind on her bunk. You walk out of your cell and you enter the larger world of the prison, the noise and the chaos and all the people, all the people who are totally indifferent to you at the best and actively malicious at the worst, and you walk along the corridor and you walk down the stairs to the common area, and –

And of course, you localize Carol immediately.

She is sitting at her usual table, with a lollipop in her mouth, in the middle of a game of bridge with three other women currently in her good graces, and the rest of the hangers-on crowding around, and you –

You don't want to stare, you don't want her to notice you staring – you turn your head away, and you blink away tears, but even when you're not looking at her you can still see her so clearly, the image burned into your eyes, and it all just seems so _impossible_.

Who are you kidding? This is _Carol._ Carol the prison gang leader, the woman everyone in here defers to, a million miles away from the Carol you meet in private. How can you even _imagine_ going to her for help? How can you even imagine that _she _would help _you?_

_You're not to talk to me. You're not to look at me._

You  _promised. _

Your throat is knotting painfully, making it hard to breathe, and tears are flooding your eyes again. You have to stop, carefully out of sight, and lean against the wall and try to breathe again. You feel as if you're going to be sick, for real.

You can't do this.

You _can't._

You fucking _promised._ You promised you would _never_ be so stupid as to walk up to her, to talk to her, you promised you wouldn't as much as look at her, you promised that what you do in the showers in the middle of the night would be between the two of you only, and that no one would ever know.

The only thing you can possibly accomplish is to make her angry with you. To make her angry at you for breaking your promise, for breaking the deal, for being so stupid as to think she will ever allow you to talk to her, to even look at her, outside of the narrow confines of your nights together. Angry enough to never call you to the showers again, and all you'd accomplish would be to ruin the best thing that has ever happened to you.

She wouldn't help you, she wouldn't put herself on the line for you. She would just think you're pathetic, deserving of whatever happens to you – that this whole thing is your own fault, for being so weak. And besides, she probably knows already – knows, and just doesn't care, at least not enough to _do_ anything about it.

And you think, suddenly and unbidden, of your mother.

Your mother, who has come to visit you exactly the once. Exactly the once to sit there on the other side of the glass with the phone in hand, telling you she won't be able to come visit, that this was exactly the once just to tell you so. Your mother, who is still with _him_. You knew that from the way she was sitting on the other side of the glass that day, the way she was shaking her head and avoiding your eyes when she said she wouldn't be able to come visit. The way she shook her head when you told her desperately _mom you have to leave him_ and you knew that she never will, that he will never let her leave, that he has broken her again and again and again until there's nothing left of the woman she used to be, you knew that from the way she shook her head, again and again, and didn't meet your eye and said no, he is a good man, a good man.

_A good man._ Repeating that over and over, as if that could make it true.

And Carol –

You know Carol is not a good person. You have always known that. Carol is a killer and a gang-leader and an unrepentant criminal, she's dangerous and unpredictable and in possession of some hard cold streak that has made her the unquestioned boss of the cell-block for thirty years, something intangible but undisputedly _real_ that makes absolutely everyone in here terrified to go against her.

And yet –

Yet, for all that, she has been _better_ to you than anyone else you have ever met.

She has been the answer to your every secret deep dark prayer, she has given you absolutely everything you have ever wanted, everything you have never even known how to ask for, before her. She has grabbed you by the jaw and told you she wants to hurt you, and she _has_ hurt you, she has tied you up and torn into your deepest depths with her teeth and her razors and her whips, leaving cuts and bruises and echoes all over your body, but she has always, always, made it clear that she wants to do this to you because you _like_ it, she has told you that if you want her to stop she'll stop, and you have never ever even for a moment doubted that she will.

Carol is probably the last person on earth you should have ever trusted but you have trusted her, anyway. You have trusted her, paradoxically and insanely despite being terrified of her, even though you probably really, really shouldn't have – you have trusted her despite knowing exactly what she is capable of, despite knowing exactly how dangerous she is.

And that is perhaps the worst thing about this whole situation:

That the moment those women walked into your cell, snatching away your fragile sense of peace and security, they also made you doubt that terrible, implicit trust.

You stand there with eyes closed, leaning against the wall and tears leaking down your cheeks, feeling the echoes of her whip and her razors in the vague stinging on your skin, under your clothing, and you know you have to do this.

You have to do this. You _have to_, even though you can't, even if you have no right to expect anything at all from her. You have to, even if it makes your throat knot, even if it makes you sick to your stomach.

You have to tell her, because you have to trust her. You have to trust her to _not_ want you to go to that broom closet, you have to trust the echoes of her pain on your body to tell you that she would prefer you breaking your promises to _that. _You have to trust the memory of her eyes on you, the way she looks at you, the way she has _never _made you feel like nothing. You have to trust her to be the very polar opposite of your fucking stepfather, because if you don't –

Because if you don't –

If you don't trust her - if you _can't_ trust her - then you will never again be able to stand in front of her and tell her to do anything she wants to you. At least not in any way that is beautiful, and true. If she does nothing, if she gets angry, if she thinks this is all your own fault, then – then her tying you up and cutting you and bruising you will suddenly be no different from all the other people who have hurt you in ways that only tear you down, only destroy.

And you can't stand that. Anything but that.

So.

You do it.

You take a deep shaking breath and you take a shaking step across the floor of the common area, and then another, you walk on shaking legs across the common room, without looking at her once, and you –

No, you don't walk straight up to her.

You're not stupid.

There is some part of you, deep inside of you, that has analyzed the situation without you even really having been conscious of it. A part of you that has found if not a _solution_ exactly, then something that is at least an attempt at a middle ground, something that at least gives you a _chance_ of doing this in a way that maybe, maybe, will not result in total disaster.

So you just walk.

You walk across the common area, and when you come to an empty table, just in her line of sight, you sit down.

You sit down by a table in her line of sight, and your heart is pounding and you're sick to your stomach, because you _know_ she notices you. You know she doesn't even look up from her cards, you know her eyes never once touch you, but she knows, anyway.

She sees you, and she understands.

At least you hope that she does, because if she doesn't, well –You don't know how much more un-subtle you dare to be.

After sitting there by the table for what you think is several minutes – it feels like longer, but your heart is in your throat and every heartbeat feels like an eternity – you get up.

You get up, and you head for the bathroom, and you don't look back.

Of course you don't.

You go to the bathroom, and there is another woman in there washing her hands – she doesn't even glance at you as you go stand next to her and wash your hands, too, soap and water running down between your fingers and you wonder, stupidly, how long you can stand here washing your hands, how long before you can know for certain whether she will come or not, at exactly what point you will have to start to wonder, for real, if you really were _too _subtle or if she just chose to ignore you –

Then, the other woman walks out, and Carol walks in.

You _know_ – you know, from the way that other woman shies back, backs a step to not collide with her, mumbles _sorry, carol_ in a small deferential voice and disappears almost before your eyes dart to the scene and you see Carol walking into the bathroom.

You look away immediately, of course, heart pounding with both relief and terror until you no longer know which is which.

You concentrate on pretending to wash your hands instead, sickly lump growing bigger in your throat, keeping your eyes firmly glued to your hands for the moment it takes Carol to take two strides into the bathroom and brush by you, giving you that split second of slowing down next to you, a question in her hard eyes, a split second of a chance to tell her what you signaled her here for –

And you _have_ to say it, you have to spit it out now, because you only have this split second, and it is far too late to change your mind now.

”Brannon and DeLuca are going to make me suck C.O. Hellmans's dick”, you murmur, without looking at her, without looking, but you feel her close to you, her heat and her presence and you feel as if you're going to –

”I'll take care of it”, she murmurs back, almost before you have managed to finish she sentence.

And then she has moved on and you stand there and try to grasp that it was that easy, that she –

_I'll take care of it, _she said. You can still hear hear words echoing in your mind: _I'll take care of it._

You cannot quite place the infliction, there: perhaps only the slightest hint of annoyance. Perhaps the slightest hint of something that was almost – or would have been, in anyone else but her – reassurance.

You get the hell out of that bathroom, though.

You dry your hands quickly, too quickly, and then you go. You go back across the common area and back to your cell and you curl up in the corner of your bed with your arms around your knees, because you are scared now, in an entirely new way. You are scared now, because you have placed the entire matter in her hands, and now, all you can do is wait, and see.

When it is time for dinner, you go, of course. You go to dinner and you sit there in your usual corner, trying hard to be invisible. You eat your dinner even though when your tray is empty you couldn't have said what it was, and then you go back to your cell, to your bunk.

You do not exactly try to look for Brannon and DeLuca, at dinner, but you do not happen to see them there, either.

You sit on your bed with your book on your lap but without reading until it is almost time for lights-out, and then you go brush your teeth, and then you climb under your blankets.

You cannot sleep, though. The guards turn off the lights and Mason starts snoring a good ten minutes after that, but you cannot sleep.

The same thoughts keep running through your head: You told Carol. And she told you she'd take care of it.

And you do think she meant it – you can't imagine that she'd say so, if she didn't mean it, and that presumably means that you are safe from Brannon and DeLuca and from having to get down on your knees in that broom closet, and you should be grateful about that, at least, you_ are_ grateful about that, but –

Does that mean that you're safe from _her?_

Does that mean that you are safe from her getting angry at you, for breaking your promise, for breaking the deal?

Does that mean that you're going to get to keep _this, her?_

Or does it mean, only, that she'll do you this one favor but afterwards never call you again, never have you woken up in the middle of the night, again?

Of that, you are frighteningly uncertain.

And therefore, you are still wide awake almost two hours later, when Miriam comes to your cell.

You are wide awake, so Miriam doesn't even enter. She just stops by the door, meeting your eye, and nods in the direction of the corridor, and you feel sick, violently, again.

Because of course, it is not like Miriam, at this point, needs to say anything. You know: _Carol wants to see you._

And you would be stupid to think that it doesn't have anything to do with what happened today. It has been only two days, after all – it's an obvious disruption of the usual schedule.

Your heart pounds with fear and your head swims sickeningly when you swing your legs over the edge of the bed and get up. Yes, real fear this time – not that sweet, pulse-quickening anticipation you have come to associate with these occasions.

Fear, because this time, you really have no idea what is in store.

You are grateful that Miriam doesn't say anything when you trail after her in the direction of the showers. Your head spins and you feel sick and you try, desperately, to find words for some kind of defense, but you can't.

You know that if Carol is angry with you, if she –

No, you don't know what you can possibly say in your defense. You broke the deal, and now – Now you'll just have to live with the consequences.

And when you arrive at the usual door, when Miriam goes to stand at her usual place, when you open the door, and see Carol sitting there on her bench, the world lurches sickeningly again –

– Because, she is fully clothed. She is not wearing her usual towel, there is nothing usual about this situation, at all.

And you –

You have been meaning to apologize, of course. You've fully expected that the moment you saw her, you would fall down on your knees and you would beg and you would plead with her to please, please forgive you.

But now that you see her, sitting there with her legs crossed and carefully controlled, inscrutable look on her face, something tightens in your throat, the apology curling up on itself, refusing to come out, and you swallow, trying to will that lump away, because on some level, you do want to just break down and beg for her forgiveness, but on another –

On another, you cannot possibly bring yourself.

Because you had to _know_. You _had to_, and you cannot possibly bring yourself apologize for that.

If you loose everything, then you will loose it, and then you will just have to live with that. Ten long years of prison, prison without _her_, ten years of seeing her from the corner of your eye and knowing what you had and how you threw it away, because you were stupid enough to think you could possibly _mean_ something to her. Mean enough to her that she would care more about _you_ than about you breaking your promise to her.

You cross your arms over your chest, over the terrified pounding if your heart, and you try to keep from crying, try to keep the tears stinging in your eyes from falling out, and you wait.

And wait.

For her reaction, for her judgment.

”I broke the deal”, you say, when she still says nothing – your voice is trembling, your entire body is trembling, but you can't stand the silence, can't stand the not _knowing._

Carol purses her lips, her shoulder twitching in something that is not quite a shrug.

”You did”, she agrees, voice indifferent, and in a way, that is far worse than anger, because it still doesn't answer the question.

The tears twist in your throat, a painful choking sensation, and you try to draw in breath, a deep shaking breath to keep the tears from welling out because you really, really don't want to cry in front of her, and you lean your head back in instinct, looking up at the roof so she won't see your tears but of course she does, anyway.

Carol breathes out, an annoyed – perhaps even angry – sound.

“_Fuck_”, she says. “Did you really think I'd be angry?” She _sounds_ angry, just for asking, her voice rough in her throat. “What the fuck were you supposed to do, then, huh?” she says. “Do you really think I would have preferred it if you'd just gone ahead and sucked his fucking cock?”

You open your mouth and you close it again, because you honestly don't know how to answer. Some very complicated feeling is twisting in your guts, and you are scared of what she might be able to read in your eyes. _Did_ you? Not really, not exactly – but you also did think that it was _possible_.

“Come here”, Carol says.

It's an order, an absolutely unquestionable order, spoken in a hard terrifying voice, so you do. You do, even though your stomach lurches and your knees shake – you take those steps over to her side of the room, and you –

You don't know what she expects you to do, exactly, what she wants you to do once you're there, but you find yourself dropping to the floor in front of her, almost against your will. Down on the floor in front of her, almost kneeling – because you have been, already, as brave as you can possibly bring yourself to be, because there is something utterly unthinkable about standing in front of her while she sits, and something absolutely impossible about the thought of sitting down next to her, as if you were or as if you would ever imagine that you were equals.

Carol grabs you by the jaw and lifts your face, making you look at her.

“I'm not fucking letting anything happen to you”, she says in a low voice, her eyes cold and hard terrifying. “Do you know what I did, after you told me? Do you _want_ to know?”

You don't, but you _do_ – you don't nod exactly, but Carol seems to read some combination of fear and assent in your expression, anyway.

“I took some of my girls”, she says, in that same voice, low and controlled with the anger lurking just below the surface, “and we went and found Brannon and DeLuca. Stupid bitches were sitting right there in the middle of the room, laughing as if they didn't have a fucking care in the world. They didn't laugh when I told them to come with me, and they sure as fuck didn't laugh when I told my girls to beat them bloody. Brannon kept crying and asking what they had even _done_, but DeLuca was a little smarter, she got it, almost immediately, she kept crying about how _sorry_ they were and how they didn't _know._” Carol snorts, disgusted. “As if that was supposed to be some kind of an _excuse._ They sure as fuck know _now_.” Something moves on her face, the anger twisting across her features. “I broke their fingers and I kicked in their ribs, myself. They won't bother you again. And neither will anyone else. If anyone ever tries to pull anything like that again, I'll fucking _kill_ them.”

And you –

There's a part of you that is horrified at her story, of course there is, horrified at the thought of all that _violence_, horrified at the thought of broken ribs and broken fingers, horrified about that happening because of _you._ Horrified at the memory of your own naivety in thinking she could just _tell_ them to leave you alone and they would – and yes, probably they _would_ have, but, no, that was not how Carol did it, not how she was ever going to do it.

But –

_I'm not letting anything happen to you. They won't bother you again. And neither will anyone else. _

There is another part of you, too. A part of you that cannot even quite be horrified, a part of you that knows that it is not like they wouldn't have done the same to you. Like they wouldn't have – as they put it, in your cell – beaten you until you were begging for your pathetic little life, if you had refused to go to that broom closet.

_If anyone ever tries to pull anything like that again, I'll fucking _ kill _ them._

A part of you that knows with an absolute certainty that should somehow be more frightening than it is, that she means it, that she is perfectly capable of it. You know this and you have always known this: That Carol is _dangerous_, for real – that there is some cold hard streak in her that makes her capable of terrible things, that if she wants someone dead, that someone will be _dead._

And there is a part of you, certainly, that doesn't exactly want anyone to get killed – to _die_ – on your behalf, and yet – Yet. You swallow, tears leaking helplessly down your cheeks, Carol's fingers firm around your jaw, her eyes cold and hard and utterly steady in yours, and there is that _other_ part of you, the part of you that has been curled up on itself and terrified for as long as you can remember, finally, finally stretching out, finally starting to _relax. _

A part of you that _wants _it – a part of you that wants all that Carol is, all of her unrepentant terrible _violence_, the sense of _protection_ that lives in her very real threat to kill people for you – a desire not for people to _die_ exactly but for people to _know_, to _understand_, that there will be _consequences_ to hurting you, to trying to make you do anything you don't want.

A part of you that is merely overwhelmingly, all-consumingly _grateful._ Grateful that finally, _finally_, at least _someone_ in your life has gotten what they deserve.

And you don't want to cry, but of course you cry, anyway.

_Shit._

“_I'm sorry_”, you choke out, “I'm so, so sorry...”

“What the fuck are you _sorry_ for?” Carol hisses, as if she really doesn't get it. “You don't think they deserved it?”

“No”, you sniffle, “no, I mean – You told me to not talk to you, out there”, you manage, the fact that you _did, _anyway, twisting in your guts. “You told me – That this was to be between us only, and that no one should ever know, and – people will... _know_. I'm so _so_ sorry.” ”

The apology feels so woefully inadequate, and you know that no matter how many times you repeat it, it will never be enough, because you cannot help but feel – Not that you_ made_ her do it, because it's not as if _you_ could ever make _her_ do anything, but as if this whole situation is your fault, for doubting her.

For thinking there was any other way she could possibly react. For wanting to know when you really, really _should_ have known, anyway. You talked to her. You _told_ her. And she – She walked up to Brannon and DeLuca, right in the middle of the room. She told them to come with her, and everyone in the room saw that. Everyone in the room saw them not returning, and everyone will – once Brannon and DeLuca return from the infirmary, if not before - know _why._

“Do you think I fucking _care_ about that?”, Carol hisses, her fingers still hard around your jaw. “I didn't say I didn't want anybody to _know. _I said I didn't want you to go around _telling_ people, or acting as if you could do whatever the hell you want just because I'm... fucking you. And you _haven't_, because you're not _stupid_. You think people in here – You think people don't _talk?_ You think I can bring you here night after night and have no one _notice? _People aren't _blind_, at least not the ones that aren't stupid.” She snorts, anger twisting her face again. “If Brannon and DeLuca had been paying a little attention to something besides their own drug addiction this wouldn't even had happened. They _should_ have fucking known. Stupid bitches.”

_They should have known._ There's a strange shiver running down your back. The realization that perhaps, perhaps, the reason nothing like this has happened before is because at least people _suspected._ That perhaps your connection to Carol is not, in fact, entirely invisible and unseen – that perhaps, there has been all this time some kind of protection extending from the fact that at least people _suspected - _and somehow that realization is _too much, _too much to take in, serving only to underline your own inadequacy. _What the fuck were you supposed to do then, huh?_ she asked, as if you really didn't have a choice, but you _did_ have a choice, of course you did –

“I'm sorry I'm so weak”, you whisper, looking down on the floor, unable to meet her eyes, and regretting the words the moment they have forced their way out of your throat, as if admitting to it will only make it worse. “ – I should have just –” you keep babbling, helplessly, “I should have just taken care of it myself, just – just walked up to them and – shivved them, or something...”

The idea feels just as crazily unrealistic now as it did in your cell, and yet, there is still a part of you that thinks that is exactly what you should have done, or, at least, that you should have been the sort of person who could do that. The sort of person who could assert herself the moment she walks into prison, who shows everyone that she is _not_ weak, that she is not to be messed with, and something twists in your throat. Old, deep hurt – the kind that says that everything bad that has ever happened to you is your own fault, that you don't deserve better, that if you were better, stronger, none of that would have happened, even though you _know_ – even though there is a _part_ of you that knows – that it is not true.

But Carol merely snorts, a long exhalation of breath that is almost a sigh, and she lets go of your jaw instead of making you look at her, again.

“And then, what?”, she says, sounding more annoyed than angry. “Fuck, that would have been a mess. If you'd shivved those bitches, you'd have to shiv all their stupid friends, too, when they'd come to pay you back. And you don't have any friends, so you'd be dead_._” Something about her tone of voice softens slightly. “That would have been fucking stupid”, she says, almost gently. “You shouldn't go around starting shit you can't finish. You did exactly what you should. You fucking _told_ me, so I could fucking _stop_ them. I'm not letting anyone hurt you. You're _mine._”

And you nod.

You nod, the _relief_ flooding your entire body, making you feel faint. You know you probably shouldn't, but you find yourself lowering your head down onto her leg anyway, practically putting your head on her lap even despite the rush of fear that you cannot possibly be allowed such a gesture.

But Carol says nothing about it. The muscles in her leg stiffen slightly for a split-second only, almost as if she is surprised, but then she relaxes. She allows it. She lets you lean your head on her lap, and her fingers curl and rub slightly at the nape of your neck, almost gently. There is possessiveness in the gesture, certainly, but something else, too, something kinder.

Protectiveness, perhaps.

Because if you have learned anything about Carol, in these months, it is that whatever paradoxical gentleness there is in her, it does not live behind her cold gray eyes revealing nothing. It lives in her hands and in the tips of her fingers, in the way her touch feels on your neck, now.

_You're mine._

She won't let anyone hurt you. You're _safe._

“You're not weak”, Carol says, unexpectedly – there's no comfort in her voice, it's merely stating a fact, but you stiffen slightly anyway, because you had almost thought, hoped, that she had forgotten about that statement of yours. “I've been in prison for almost thirty years, I know weakness. _You_ – If you'd been weak, you'd have broken the moment I asked why you kept staring at me, instead of fucking looking me in the eye and telling me the truth.” Carol snorts again, a little softer. “You're fucking crazy”, she says, “but you're not weak.”

You do not exactly believe her, but you do not exactly _not_ believe her, either. It is true, at least, that the moment you heard yourself telling her you were staring because you had never been so attracted to anyone in your life, you _felt_ strong.

That, in giving yourself to her and surrendering to her, you have _always_ felt strong.

“I'm _yours_”, you whisper, barely believing that you are allowed to say it, that you are allowed that _claim – _but even saying it, feeling the words in your mouth, makes you feel _different. _Makes you feel, deep in your bones, the indisputable _truth_ of that statement – that it is, perhaps, the most true, the most important thing about you.

Carol's fingers curl in the nape of your neck, again. “Yes”, she says, simply. “You are.” She draws a deep breath, one you can feel in her entire body. “Go have a shower”, she says then.

It's an order, of course – and one that feels a little strange, at first. You lift your head from her lap, and you nod, of course, meeting her eye briefly – that cold inscrutable expression she has, completely devoid of emotion, and yet, that brief moment of her eyes in yours reassures you that whatever she means by it, you can trust it.

And when you stand there in the warm water, the heat of it washing away everything about this horrible day, you recognize it as an amazingly _kind _thing to order. As something you _needed_, right now, without even being conscious of needing it. The hot water runs down your skin and your body, relaxing the tensions in your muscles, and Carol sits on the bench and watches you silently – arms crossed over her chest, eyes hard and cold and yet there is something about her expression that makes it impossible for you to even be self-conscious about being naked in the shower in front of her.

You close your eyes, feeling her gaze on your body, almost as tangible as the hot water, even more deeply relaxing than the heat from the shower. Her eyes, trailing the cuts and bruises on your body, all the marks she has left on you. The long red welts from her whip, the cuts from her razor blade, the bruises from her teeth.

_You're mine._ Her eyes on you, a cold hard caress, an absolute and utter certainty.

When, at length, you turn the shower off, she silently hands you a towel, a gesture so unexpected it makes your heart thump while you dry yourself off - because everything about tonight is unexpected, apparently. Unexpected, new, different.

“Lie down”, she says, then, and nods at the floor, spreading another towel next to one that is already there – and that, too, is something absolutely new. You are used to being tied up and backed up against the wall now, that is how this _goes -_ but not tonight, apparently.

Tonight, she is telling you to lie down.

So you do. You lie down on the towels on the floor, on your back with the towel you used to dry yourself draped over you, hiding most of your nakedness, and your heart is pounding, pounding - you feel, in some strange way, more exposed on your back with that towel over you, than naked and standing up.

Carol comes down on the floor with you. Slowly and carefully, she leans over you, the ends of her hair almost touching your face, one knee between your legs - close enough for you to feel the possibility of contact but not quite close enough to actually touch you, making arousal pound between your legs, making your mouth turn dry as she fixes you with her cold, gray eyes, both a threat and a promise. She's not exactly pinning you down, not quite leaning her weight on you, but you can feel her closeness acutely, all the same, the power radiating from her almost a psychical, tangible thing.

You swallow.

“You're _mine_”, she whispers, a shade of almost anger in her voice. “_Mine._ Didn't you fucking _know_ that? Did you really fucking think I'd let anybody touch you? Did you really fucking think I'd let anybody force you to do something you don't want?”

And shit, even this – Even this, you _want._ Something about her anger – something about the fact that she is angry with you for _doubting_ her, angry at you for even a second thinking that she might care more about what you promised her than about making beyond sure that no one will hurt you – makes you ache, deep in your body and in your soul - because that anger is _right, _that is the one thing she _should_ be angry about you for.

“I –”, you whisper back, carefully, licking your lips, thinking back on the moment of leaning against the wall down in the common area, just out of sight, the storm of thoughts and emotions. The moment when you decided you had to trust her. Trust her more than the all the old hurts in you telling you differently.

“If I'd _really_ thought that”, you whisper, swallowing, “I wouldn't have told you.”

Carol breathes out – you can feel the ghost of the exhalation on your face, and you can tell she knows exactly what you didn't say, as well.

“Don't _ever_ fucking doubt me, again”, she whispers, a fierce hard angry whisper. “I'll never let anyone hurt you. _Never._”

“I _know_”, you whimper. “I'm _yours._” You still can't quite believe that she'll allow you to say that, to _be_ that, the words you're saying sending shivers down your insides, the very act of saying them, of you daring to look her in the eye when you say it. A shiver of _freedom_ that comes with knowing _she_ can do whatever she wants and that no one else will ever get to touch you, again. A shiver of freedom that comes with knowing she will protect you, that you're _hers, _intensifying your desire for her until is almost unbearable and she hasn't even really touched you, yet. “_Yours. _No one else gets to touch me. _You..._You can do anything you want to me”, you whisper – it's true, it's always been true, but yet, you feel it more acutely than ever, now. “Anything you want. _Anything._”

“I _know_”, Carol whispers, her breath coming quicker against your skin. “_Fuck_. I _know._”

And with an exhalation of breath that is almost a moan, she leans forwards and bites at your throat, her teeth hard and sharp and making you gasp in anticipation even though the bite is not half as hard as you want it to be.

“You're _mine_”, she whispers, and bites you again, slightly harder. “_Mine._ For me to do anything I fucking want to.” Her tongue darts out to lick at your neck, tongue hot and wet on the still raw cuts where she ran her razor down your skin only two nights ago.

“_Yes._” A moan more than a word, the arousal curling and intensifying in you, and you tilt your head further, silently begging her for more bites, for _more_ _– _“_Please._”

And what she does is something else entirely unexpected.

She kisses your neck.

She kisses your neck, a raw hungry possessive kiss, and you gasp – not only from the _sensation_ of it, but from the _fact_ of it, because she has never ever done anything like that, before. She has bit you, sometimes hard and sometimes almost gently, and she has licked at the wounds her razor has left on your skin, but she has never before _kissed_ you, anywhere.

She kisses your neck, and then she bites you again, the contrast almost undoing you completely. “_Fuck_”, you moan, your entire body arching into her, into her mouth and her knee and her pain. “Fuck, Carol... _Carol._”

And then she does it again.

Her tongue flicks across the skin on your neck, your skin and your bruises and your wounds, warm and wet and soft, and then, she bites you again – bites you, and kisses you, hard fierce kisses down you neck, down your throat, down your collarbones, bites and licks and kisses, making you arch hopelessly into the almost-touch of her knee between her legs – and, _yes, _you moan in relief as she presses her thigh down slightly in response, allowing you the contact.

You arch into her, into her knee between your legs, moaning and gasping helplessly as her tongue traces all the reminders of what she has done to you, all the marks she has left on you, biting and licking and kissing and biting again and you moan, half in relief and pleasure and half in frustrated longing for _more_, making you pant and arch and moan, making you rub the aching pained wetness between your legs against her knee, relief that is not really relief, not enough, enough to make you feel like you could come any second but not enough to actually bring you there, enough only to make you moan in frustration and ecstasy in heady, adrenaline-filled mix.

_Fuck_, you want her so _much_, right now every inch as much as you ever did the first time you ever looked at her, you want her, you need her, you crave for her to bite you harder, to tear you to pieces, to hold nothing back, to annihilate you completely, to take everything she wants from you –

Carol reaches the top of your breast, and she keeps going. Your heart is pounding fiercely as she kisses the sensitive flesh of your breasts, first the one and then the other, fierce and hard and yet almost carefully, almost gently, the sensation of her mouth on you, her hair tickling at your skin scratching at places inside you which are raw and pained and wide open for her, wide open for her like they have never been for anyone else.

You almost cannot dare to believe she will go as far as to touch your nipples, but she does.

You cry out, half a scream, as Carol's tongue flicks across your nipple, a spike of light though your every nerve, arching into Carol's mouth, Carol taking your hard aching nipple in her mouth and sucking. Fuck, she has never never done anything like that to you before and her mouth on your breasts and on your nipples feels so agonizingly, amazingly _good_ \- you love it, of course you love it, and yet, yet, it's not _enough_, yet it only inflames that deeper darker craving in you further and further and further until you think it will drive you crazy.

And Carol knows that. Of course she knows that.

Her teeth close over your hard nipple.

You scream, for real. Hell, it _hurts_ \- it hurts like hell and it sends cascades of light through your entire body, a sharp beautiful perfect spike of pain through your every nerve.

“Oh _fuck_”, you moan, helplessly, as Carol rubs your aching, raw nipple with her tongue, “_please. again._”

Carol makes a sound, half a moan and half assent, and bites at the soft flesh right next to your nipple, instead – not hard, not hard enough, but you moan anyway, you moan helplessly as she kisses your breasts again, kisses you and bites you, hard and sharp, her teeth bruising the tender flesh, leaving marks, marks of her teeth all over your breasts, and when her tongue flicks over your nipple again you know what is coming, you are ready for it, Carol bites your nipple and you scream – you scream, and you soar, the pain perfect and true and beautiful, fire in your ever nerve.

And again, and again. You are lost in this, lost in her mouth on your breasts, her tongue and her teeth and her kisses, for what seems like an eternity of perfect pleasure, perfect pain, the one feeding and intensifying the other, her mouth and her deep, panting breath on your breasts and your nipples, alternating, bites and kisses and flicks of her tongue across your nipples, your nipple in her mouth, sucking and biting and sucking again, something raw and hungry and possessive in every kiss and every bite echoing _mine, mine, mine,_ your nerves raw and aching until you don't know if you can stand anymore but not wanting her to stop, not wanting her to ever, ever stop –

Carol lifts her head from your breasts, her perfect hair slightly tousled, a look in her eyes you haven't ever seen before, something almost uncontrolled.

“I want –”, she says, voice rough, her breath coming deep and fast, ” – I want to fucking _scar_ you. I want to write my name on you.”

You almost forget to breathe. Your breath catches in your throat and your stomach tightens and arousal shoots through you in a hard, painful burst, because you –

You didn't actually think that was something she might actually _do_. You thought it was something she teased you with only, teasing you and turning you on with her _I might someday, if you deserve it, _and it did turn you on, fiercely, every time, to imagine that she might, that she might one day take that razor blade and slice through your flesh and write her goddamn _name_, but you didn't think, you didn't think you had any right to hope, that she ever actually _would_ –

“_Fuck._” The curse comes out more faintly that you intended, and your heart is pounding, pounding, and your mouth is dry because you know cutting that deeply will _hurt _and you _want_ it, of course you _want_ it, you want it more than fucking _anything._ “_Really?_”

“Yes”, Carol breathes, her breath quick on your face. “Tell me yes, and I fucking will.”

“_Yes_”, you groan, feeling as if you'll faint. “_Fuck. Yes!_”

“_Fuck_”, Carol moans, and dives down on your throat again - a quick swipe of her tongue and a hard, fierce bite, a burst of pain and pleasure through your entire body, and you scream, and she bites you again, and again, hard hungry bites holding nothing back, and, _fuck, _you scream again, pressing yourself against her her, so fucking close to coming, so wet it hurts, her bites on your throat taking and taking and you giving, giving her absolutely everything you have to give.

Absolutely everything you have to give, in her bites and kisses, down your throat and your chest, across your breasts again and _down,_ hard and fierce and reaching the top of your stomach, one hard almost angry kiss at the top of the untouched, unhurt skin of your stomach before she pulls away, up, in what seems like an effort of almost inhuman control.

“Okay”, Carol breathes, pulling herself up slightly, her weight leaving you, pulling herself away from you and into some sort of control. “_Fuck._ Okay.”

And from somewhere in her clothing, she pulls out her razor blade.

And the sight of that blade in her hand makes an other wave of painful arousal rush through you – as it does, as it always does, but deeper now, deeper and darker and more heady than before now that you know what she is actually about to do this time, turning your mouth dry, the rush of adrenaline making your head spin and you are grateful to be lying down already because you don't think you could possibly stand up right now.

“Yes”, you say, even though she hasn't even asked, “_Yes. Please._”

Carol swallows. “Where?” she asks.

_Where?_ There's a part of you that's overwhelmed that she's asking you that, that she's letting _you_ decide, but there's another part, too, that _knows_ – that feels as if there is only one place that would be natural.

You swallow, shifting your legs, lifting your right knee slightly and indicating the inside of your thigh.

“Here”, you say in a half-choked voice, the word almost catching in your throat, for a split second scared that Carol will question your decision or make you explain it, and you wouldn't know how, it's just that it feels _right_, right for it to be a secret place, not something that will never need to be obvious to everyone, something for you and _you_ only.

But Carol doesn't question it, and she doesn't ask you to explain, she just nods, running her fingers down and up the inside of your thigh, the place you indicated, her touch making tingles run through your entire body, making you throb with arousal.

“You deserve it”, Carol says, unexpectedly – her voice is hard and rough, and her eyes in you betray no emotion whatsoever, but you gasp with gratitude, flush with gratitude because you _know_ – at this point, damn, of course you _know_ – exactly what she means, by it.

_You deserve it, _she says, and then, before you have even properly taken in her words, she kisses the inside of your thigh.

_You deserve it. _

And you know: It's not a punishment.

It's a _reward_.

A reward, because somehow, somehow – perhaps even by contacting her in public, perhaps even by breaking the very promise you made – you have done something that she thinks deserves a reward.

And you laugh, almost, you can't help it, because this is just so utterly, absurdly insane.

That she will cut her fucking name into your thigh, and that you fucking _want_ her to.

_You're fucking crazy, _ she says, always, but she always makes it sound like an endearment, and you think that yes, perhaps you are, and yet, shit, no, you cannot possibly make yourself think there's anything  _wrong_ with that. 

Carol smiles.

She looks up at you, her eyes hungry and tender and predatory, and she smiles, like you have never seen her smile, before.

And then she cuts you.

She cuts you, the razor blade slicing into your flesh an intense sharp burst of pain, but you have been waiting for the the pain, you have anticipated the pain – and you ride it, you let it left you high, and you arch and you scream and it is the most beautiful thing you have ever experienced.

It hurts, of course it hurts - the sting of the razor is deeper and sharper than the shallow cuts she has given you before - it feels as if it is slicing through every nerve you have, wounding you deep, the blood rushing out in response, you can feel it, but Carol has anticipated that, of course she has, you feel her dabbing at the wounds with some cloth before she presses her blade into you again, and it's crazy and insane but you _want_ it, hell you _want_ it, you want it like nothing on earth.

Again, again – deep, curving stinging cuts, quick and sure and beautiful, the rush of adrenaline making you, paradoxically, feel faint– it makes your head spin, Carol's blade slicing into your thigh, again and again, cutting deeply into you and marking you and scaring you and claiming you, the pain sending you flying, high, high, making you twitch under her razor but her other hand is steady on your thigh, holding you still when she cuts.

You have never, ever felt so _free _as you do when she cuts her name into your thigh.

And abruptly, it is finished.

You know because the pain stops, because she lifts her razor blade away and doesn't immediately bring it down again, and you are almost disappointed. Disappointed, for all that your heart pounds and pounds and you want to look but you are almost too weak to raise your head, to open your eyes. Adrenaline, not blood-loss - because of course it bleeds, it bleeds a lot, you can feel blood running, trickling down the inside of your thigh, Carol dabbing at the stinging wounds, and you know the cuts are fairly _deep_, but also, that they are nowhere near _dangerously_ so, that they will bleed for a while but that they'll stop, they'll heal.

“Shit”, Carol murmurs, almost softly. “You'll look after this, huh? Don't let it get infected. I'll get you something for it, don't worry.”

But you don't worry, of course you don't worry – you're more relaxed than you have ever been in your life, happiness pounding through your veins and arousal throbbing between your legs, your soul still soaring, flying.

So you just make a small sound in response, and you can almost feel Carol's almost-smile, in return. “You wanna look?” she asks.

So you look. You look down on the inside of your thigh, at the result: Even, carefully done, both larger and smaller than you expected from the intense pain of her cutting it: _Carol_, in careful curving bloody razor-sharp lines, burning on the inside of your thigh.

For you to carry on your body for the rest of your life.

“_Fuck_”, you groan faintly, and let your head slump back again, the arousal bursting through you in a wave that is almost exhausting in it's intensity, as Carol covers the wound up with the towel, wrapping it around your leg to soak up the blood.

And Carol smiles again, the way she only smiles when she hurts you, something deep and secret twitching near her mouth, her eyes glittering with something that you have come to read as arousal, and perhaps, perhaps, something else, too.

Pride, maybe.

“Spread your legs for me”, she says.

So you do.

Of course you do, because she told you to.

You spread your legs, and the towel you have used to cover yourself shifts with the movement, exposing you, and Carol pulls it away, entirely.

She pulls the towel away, and she looks at you – exposed for her, wet and aching and naked, painfully slick and pounding with need for her. She looks at you like no one else has ever looked at you – with that strange, cold appraisal that means that she wants you and knows she can have you, but also, that she'll never take anything from you that you don't want to give.

“I want to taste you”, Carol breathes.

It is almost, almost a question, her eyes in yours making sure that is something you want, and something contracts painfully inside of you, your arousal already almost at a peak, almost bursting.

”_Yes_”, you gasp, “fuck. _Anything you want_.”

_Anything._ She knows that, already. Of course she does, because that almost-smile ghosts over her face again, and she leans down, and kisses the inside of your thigh again – low, her mouth agonizingly close to all of your aching wetness, her exhalation of breath a warm flush against your most sensitive places.

And then, she touches your clit with the tip of her tongue.

You twitch, a scream bursting out of you, almost coming from that light touch _because_ it's so agonizing light, barely even a whisper of the very tip of her tongue on your aching swollen clit. You scream, a long whimpering sound, grabbing at the towels under your hands, desperate for anything to hold onto as you twitch into her mouth, and you know the warm flush of air is her almost laughing and for one desperate split-second you wonder if this will be all the taste you'll get.

But Carol is not that cruel. The tip of her tongue descends on your clit again, still agonizingly unbearably feather-light but _there,_ circling your clit, a painful teasing almost too intense drawing out of pleasure and you cry out again, you clutch at the towels and you want to beg but all the sounds in yours throat are screams and you nearly weep with relief as the swirl of her tongue becomes firmer, deeper.

As she uses more of her tongue, licking you deep and true and real, and you know you are moments from coming, that you have been for a long time already, and you scream again and push yourself against her tongue, onto her tongue licking swirling eating you, and for a split-second your eyes come open and you see her doing this to you.

Carol, eyes closed, her tongue between your legs.

Dangerous, beautiful Carol.

Carol, who'll never let anyone hurt you. Who'll fucking kill anyone who tries.

Carol, who carved her _name _into your thigh with a razor blade.

You scream her name when you come. You scream her name, and your entire body archs and twists and contracts in wave after wave of pleasure, as you come on her tongue, twitching hopelessly helplessly into her mouth, you scream her name and feel as if you will never stop.

The orgasm passes like a storm and you are left exhausting and panting, releasing the towels from your clutching pained fists, trying to remember how to breathe again. You feel Carol lifting herself up, slowly, carefully, touching the inside of your knee in an oddly tender, reassuring gesture as she turns herself up into some kind of sitting position, leaning her back against the bench. You can hear her breath in the quiet – deep, slow breaths, sounding strangely satisfied for someone who hasn't even removed a single item of clothing all night.

“Do you want me to...” you manage to ask finally, swallowing to help your dry throat, your heartbeat and breathing slowly calming down to manageable levels. “Do you want me to... do anything, for you?”

Carol shakes her head, drawing a deep breath. “Next time”, she says, meeting you eye, a hint of a smile in the corner of her mouth. “Not tonight. Next time, I... won't be this gentle with you.”

_Gentle._ She carves her name into your thigh with a razor blade, and she calls that _gentle._

And absurdly, she is not wrong.

“_Thank you_”, you say, closing your eyes, the depth of your gratitude almost overwhelming.

And even with your eyes closed, you can practically feel Carol's gaze on you, how she doesn't look away from you.

“For what?” she asks after a heartbeat, almost softly.

_Shit._ You don't even know how to answer that, but you open your eyes and look back at her, all the same. “For _everything_”, you say, the words seeming so paltry and small and incapable of encompassing everything you feel for her. “For _this_”, you say, indicating the wound on your thigh, the raw aching lines the psychical manifestation of you being _hers._ “For being... gentle. And for... _not_ being gentle. For... hurting me.” Dare you say it? “...For giving me everything I have ever wanted.”

For making you _hers._ For making you feel safe, and free, and happy.

Even strong.

_Different. _

“Mm”, Carol says, and it's true you seldom see things in her eyes, she guards her emotions too well, but now there is something there, almost a _loosening_ somehow, a strange deep understanding.

Then neither of you says anything else, for a while. The silence stretches out and fills the room, a strange calm silence, and you wonder vaguely if you should go, but you don't even have the energy to move, and besides, she doesn't seem to expect you to leave.

So you merely lie back on the towels on the floor, and you breathe, and you relax, and you feel her presence beside you, all of her strength and protection and kindness and cruelty, and the inside of your thigh throbs, steadily and regular, the pain a reminder, a friend.

“We...” Carol says, finally, “We should maybe get you another cell mate, too. If you want. Miriam, maybe, if you think that'd be... acceptable?”

You had not even considered that a possibility. To be _rid_ of Mason, _rid_ of her stifling condescending silences and derogatory remarks

“Shit”, you say, the relief flushing in, fresh air into a windowless room. “I fucking _hate_ my cell mate. _Anyone_ would be better than her. ”

Carol snorts. “Done”, she says, and you know that for Carol it is as easy as to say so – of course it is.

You just never thought of it as a possibility that she would do it, for you.

You breathe out. “Thank you”, you say, again, your throat twisting. You didn't think your gratitude could grow any greater, but here it is, swelling to even larger proportions.

Silence, again.

”Thank _you_”, Carol says then, as if she has carefully thought about that statement, and you look up at that, turn your head and meet her eye – deeply, deeply surprised.

_For what? _you don't ask but she answers, anyway.

”I never knew”, she says slowly, _“_how fucking much I needed this, before now.”

*

The next evening, you are sitting by a table almost all by yourself, eating your dinner, when Carol walks by your table.

She walks by your table, and when she passes you, she puts her hand on your shoulder.

It is a very brief touch, more possessive than affectionate, and yet it makes your entire world explode into light - you almost drop your fork before your brain even processes what just happened, and your head spins and your stomach turns over, because you _know_, you can practically _feel_ the combined attention in the room suddenly getting drawn, pulled, to you, to that brief moment of Carol's hand on your shoulder.

The surprise in the room, the _shift_ when more than a hundred women are suddenly forced to adjust what they thought they knew.

_She's mine_, Carol's touch says. _She's mine, and none of you get to touch her. _

_She's mine_, and even long after she has moved on, the warmth of her hand lingers on your shoulder, and you have to fight very hard to keep yourself from smiling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FINALLY. God damn that was a difficult chapter to write! 
> 
> But several rewrites later, as well as periods of being legitimately busy and/or not really in the right mindspace to work on this, here it is! So, uh, hope you all liked it, even though it got a bit darker and heavier than I expected. 
> 
> There will also be an epilogue, taking place a few years later - I've been kind of undecided on whether to include one or not, but at this point I do feel like the story needs one to round it off. It will be a considerably lighter thing than this chapter, just something small to look at their relationship a few years down the line. 
> 
> I'm not making any promises as to how long it will take me to finish it, however, because my writing process is, as you will all know by now, a very sloooow thing...


End file.
